And Then There Was Us
by SLynn
Summary: Maria Hill thought she knew what she wanted out of life. Set before/during/after movie. Spoilers for movie. Clint/Maria. Rating for language and suggestive situations.
1. Chapter 1

**Title: And Then There Was Us**  
**Author:** SLynn  
**Rating:** M  
**Fandom:** Avengers (movieverse)

**Characters:** Maria Hill, Clint Barton, Clint/Maria

**Spoilers:** For the movie.

**Summary: **Maria Hill thought she knew what she wanted out of life.

**Notes: **This fic takes place mainly before, but also during and after the Avengers movie. The chapters all vary in length, some being much longer than others, not because I necessarily wanted it that way, but that's just how I wrote it. The three shortest chapters are these first ones, so that is why I'm posting so many today. The rating is primarily for language, but there are some suggestive situations. Also... I have no idea where this came from! This isn't my primary ship but I kind of love it. I hope you do as well. Enjoy!

* * *

_**i.**_

"Agent Maria Hill, I'd like you to meet Agent Clint Barton," Agent Coulson said, gesturing towards the other man. "He's one of our assets and has agreed to give you some additional training on the range."

"You know I hate it when you call me that, Phil," Barton said, his mouth almost twisting into a smile as he patted him on the back. "Makes it sound like you ordered me out of the back of an IKEA catalog."

"If we did, we'd of returned you for a refund," Coulson joked back.

Maria watched on and was stunned into silence, managing a stiff nod which earned a shrug and eye roll from Agent Barton and a near-scowl from Agent Coulson.

She was used to it. First impressions weren't her strong suite. Neither were second impressions if she was being honest with herself.

Still, faulty facial expressions aside, she couldn't believe how flippant this man was. Agent Coulson was both his and her superior, technically, and you just couldn't call your, for lack of a better word, boss by his first name. It wasn't done. And you certainly didn't crack jokes with him. Until this moment she hadn't realized Agent Coulson could laugh. Which was how it should be.

And also, this was Barton?

Maria had been with SHIELD for five years, ever since completing her master's degree and a four year stint in the Air Force. She knew what the organization did, but largely her job had kept her in an office environment. She'd finally begun the transition to field agent, had begun to move up, and this was the first time she was actually meeting an 'asset' face-to-face. Asset was the codeword used amongst SHIELD agents for its assassins. To call them assassins seemed impolite. They were trained killers who took out targets, usually on solo missions, and had fewer constraints on them than the typical field agent.

It was strangely underwhelming.

"I'll leave you to it," Coulson said, choosing to ignore the tension that had suddenly cropped up due to Maria's less than warm response, before retreating off the range.

"All right, Agent Hill," Barton said, clipping her name short as he led her to the target he had set up. "Let's see what you've got."

"What am I supposed to do?" she asked after they'd stood there for several minutes in complete silence, staring at one another.

"Well, I suppose you could pick up that gun and shoot that target. That's why you're here, isn't it?"

"And you couldn't just say that?"

"I'm not in the habit of stating the obvious, Agent Hill."

"Are you in the habit of actually giving instruction, Agent Barton?"

"Funny thing that," he replied, smiling but in no way looking amused as he had before, "I thought I had."

Maria grit her teeth. This is more like what she'd expected. She'd met too many assholes to let him get to her, or so she thought, because as she fired the first three shots, she missed. Undeterred, she finished the clip before setting the gun down and turned her eyes back to Barton.

"Have you ever qualified on the range?" he finally asked after some more awkward and unnecessary silence.

"Yes."

"Was the administrator blind?"

"If you don't want to help me -"

"Oh, I don't," he interrupted, crossing his arms and looking completely unconcerned. "I really don't, but I told Phil I would and if I back out now, when you inevitably get yourself killed out there in the real world, he'll probably make me write the letter of condolence to your family. And I hate lying, so, first things first. Your form is awful. Your feet should be further apart and you have got to relax."

"I am relaxed," she interjected, but he steamrolled right over her words.

"I can see the tension in your shoulders and you stop breathing when you pull the trigger. Do you know what happens when you stop breathing, Agent Hill? You die. And there's me again, writing a letter full of things I don't mean. So breathe, Agent Hill. Relax. That gun won't bite you. It's probably more afraid of you than you are of it. And keep your eyes open. You can blink, but not until after you've made the shot. Is that enough instruction to start with, or do you need me to start over and speak slower?"

"No," she said, shaking her head and doing her best to refuse him the satisfaction of knowing he'd gotten under her skin, but she couldn't quite keep the anger out of her words. "That's plenty to start with, Agent Barton. Thank you."

"You are so welcome."


	2. Chapter 2

_**ii.**_

"So," a familiar voice drawled from behind, "you must still be good at pissing people off if you pulled clean up duty, Agent Hill."

"Actually," Maria said as she turned his way, "I requested this assignment, Agent Barton." When his response was a laugh, she shook her head with a scowl. "Is that so hard to believe?"

"Yes," he answered, with another laugh tacked on at the end. "It is. We're in the middle of nowhere, cleaning up after a fight we apparently missed. The fun is over. All that's left is the grunt work. So you either pissed someone off, and this is your punishment, or... or you're an even bigger stick in the mud than I imagined."

"You can't imagine someone choosing to help people? To want to get this town put back together?"

"That's not what I do."

"Obviously," she retorted, before suddenly stuck by another idea. "So... what are you doing here?" Agent Barton, smile still in place, dropped his head and actually shuffled his feet for a second, but didn't answer. "Oh, I see. Maybe I'm not the only one good at pissing people off? Is that it? Is this some kind of punishment for you?"

"It's a temporary reassignment."

"Is that what they call fucking up in SHIELD? I'm still kind of new and I'm not up on all the technical terms."

"You are really enjoying this," Barton laughed, not half as bothered as Maria wished he would be. Or at least not showing it.

"Well?" she pressed.

"Yeah, I fucked up," he admitted. "Kind of."

"Is this the part where you blame -"

"No," he interrupted, and for the first time he did sound annoyed. "I didn't mean it was someone else's fault. I just meant that..." He trailed off, as if thinking better of telling her any more. "Nothing."

"I get it."

"You do, huh?" he fired back at her, a trace of a smile still on his lips.

"I do," she said with a firm nod. "You can't admit when you're wrong."

"Yep," Barton said. "You got me."

Maria screwed up her face, momentarily disconcerted by this reply, but quickly brushing it off. "So, what exactly are you doing here if the fight is over?"

"Damage control."

"That sounds very official," she returned. "I thought you'd be doing something like security or..."

"Killing people?" he finished for her, no longer smiling even a little bit. It was startling how quickly his facial expressions changed.

"Isn't that what you do?"

"Never had someone come right out and say it to my face," he returned.

"Well?"

"Isn't that what we all do?" he fired back at her.

"I don't..."

"Not directly," Barton said, shaking his head. "Not personally, but do you really think you're not involved?"

"I didn't say that," Maria argued, not sure when or how this conversation had taken such a bad turn. She'd hoped that maybe, after so many months had passed, they might be able to start over. That they'd both be able to look past their awkward beginning and move forward. Maria didn't want to be his friend, but they had to work together. They could at least be professional. There wasn't any purpose in being so antagonistic, but Barton seemed determined. "Listen, if you have a problem with me -"

"I do, actually," he interrupted. "I do have a problem with you."

"Whatever," Maria said, shaking her head brutally. "I don't care. I'm just doing my job, same as you."

"Yeah, sure. Whatever," he returned, his back already to her as he made to leave.

"I didn't approach you, you know," she fired after him, knowing she should have dropped it already, but having to get the last word in. "You started this conversation."

Barton didn't say anything back, but he did hesitate for a moment before continuing on.

Maria wasn't sorry to see him go.


	3. Chapter 3

_**iii.**_

This time Maria spotted him before he had the chance to surprise her. She saw him come into the room, recognize her and deliberately head her way. She kept thinking that, at the last minute, he'd change direction and sit somewhere else, but no such luck. Out of all the available seats in what passed for a bar in the tiny town they were stationed in, Agent Barton picked the one right next to hers.

After he ordered, he spun around to face her, waiting for her acknowledgement. As far as she was concerned, he could keep waiting, because Maria had learned a long time ago how not to waste her time. Men like Agent Barton were at the top of that list.

"Okay then," Barton finally said after a good solid five minutes of silent staring had no effect. "Since I can see you're not going to be mature about this, I will be for the both of us."

He paused, hoping for some reaction, but Maria still wasn't biting.

"I am sorry for being an ass."

Maria's eyes darted in his direction, but didn't linger.

"Phil said -"

"So Agent Coulson put you up to this?" she interrupted, still unable to call him by his first name, even if he said it was okay if she did. Maria took regulations very seriously.

"He... He didn't put me up to this. I'm apologizing because I was wrong," he clarified. "Phil just suggested that..."

"He put you up to it."

"Yes," he admitted with an embarrassed smirk.

"You don't need to apologize," she returned, finally turning to face him. "I wasn't upset or offended or... anything, really."

"Really?"

"I'd have to care first for that to be the case," she finished.

"Ah," Barton said, raising his glass to her before tipping back the contents and quickly ordering a second.

Maria looked down at the glass sternly before meeting his eyes again.

"What?" he asked. "You don't like tequila?"

"Protocol says we're only allowed two drinks a night."

"And that was the first one..."

"No," she argued. "That was a double. That was two drinks."

"You're serious, aren't you?"

"Yes," she said earnestly, nodding her head for emphasis.

By the time she'd finished speaking the bartender had already refilled the glass, so Barton just gave her a wink before picking it up and downing the contents again.

"In case you hadn't figured it out," he informed her, "protocol doesn't apply to me."

Maria rolled her eyes at him and turned away.


	4. Chapter 4

_**iv.**_

"Hey," a familiar voice called, just from behind as Maria jogged up the desert path.

She ignored him.

"Should you really be out here by yourself?" Agent Barton asked, steadying his pace to match hers stride-for-stride. "Isn't this kind of dangerous? Running alone after dark."

"I'm an agent of SHIELD," Maria shot back at him, not bothering to look his way. "Besides, the sun just set. We've still got some light and I think I can handle myself."

"Sure you can," he laughed.

Maria shook her head and he laughed harder this time. And easily. Maria kind of hated him for that. She was already sweating profusely and breathing hard, about a mile in, and he didn't even sound winded.

"If I'm slowing you down," she said, nodding her head further up the path and hoping he'd just go.

"I'm good."

"Are you..." she started to ask, turning and finally getting a good look at him. And yes, he was in amazing shape. That was easy to see and next to impossible to deny. But that wasn't what stopped her in her tracks. "Why are you wearing sunglasses? Was the rocky path not enough of a challenge or something? You wanted the added thrill of possibly breaking a leg?"

Barton stopped and shook his head with a smile.

"Believe it or not," he answered, taking them off and handing them to her, "these are for safety."

"Safety?" He nodded and motioned for her to give them a try. Warily, she did. To her surprise, once looking through the lens, it was as if sun was back out again. She could see perfectly. "Where'd you get these?"

"R and D."

"Impressive," she said, sweeping her eyes across the desert around them once more. "I thought night vision goggles made everything green? These are crystal clear."

"Yeah, well, don't say anything, but I think that Development lifted that tech from Stark Industries."

"Is that legal?"

"Is anything we do legal?" Barton asked in return as she handed the glasses back.

Maria didn't answer him, just turned and continued her run up the steady slope behind their makeshift station.

"Is this the path you always take?" he asked after a few minutes of silence, having taken up beside her once again.

"Most everyone does."

Again they lapsed into, not an easy silence, but one of necessity. Maria wasn't a runner. She ran because it kept her in shape, but usually she could go a few miles without much of a problem. However, the rough terrain and the incline were proving more difficult than she'd first imagined it would. So, it wasn't so much that she didn't want to talk, which she kind of didn't, but that she couldn't.

He took the hint.

Once they reached the apex, Maria stopped to catch her breath. Barton stopped with her but, and she more than kind of hated him for it, he didn't even seem bothered by the climb.

"Where to next?" he asked after a few minutes.

"I was going to head back but you don't have to come with me. I wouldn't want to interrupt your run."

"You're not."

Maria said nothing, just fixed him with a stare.

"Okay," she said, not believing him. "Is this something else Agent Coulson set up? What's going on here? Does he not think I can handle myself and sent you out like some kind of deranged watchdog?"

"Actually... this one was my idea."

"Really," she said with deadly intent.

"Not because I think you're going to get eaten by a mountain lion or anything like that," he explained.

"Then why exactly are you out here following me?"

Barton dropped his head and rubbed the back of his neck, momentarily stalling for time.

"Well?" Maria pushed, crossing her arms and growing irate.

"How many times a week do you run this path?" he asked.

"What does -"

"Humor me," he interrupted.

Maria screwed up her face in a frown before giving him a crisp nod. "About three times."

"And the gym?"

"When I can," she answered, and it dawned on her where he was headed. "Wait. Do you think I'm out of shape? Because I am in excellent shape. On my physical exam, I scored in the 96th percentile."

"I'm sure it was a very tough exam."

"God, you are such an ass."

"I am," he agreed. "But, despite that, I made it up here, no problem and you..."

"I'm not used to the altitude."

"Okay," he said, his tone dismissive. "I guess that's fair."

"You don't think so?"

"I think that, once you're in the field, no one's going to give you a time out to catch your breath or a few months to adapt to the climate or altitude."

"If I wasn't in good enough shape to be a field agent, do you think they'd have put me out here?"

"Oh, I'm sure on paper you were perfect this job," he answered, and Maria could hear the condescending tone creeping into his voice. "Just like, on paper, you're an excellent marksman."

"So, what? I'm supposed to be as good as you are? Day one? Just like that?"

"Honey, no one is as good as I am."

"Don't do that. Don't call me Honey, or Sweetie, or any of the other, dozens of oh-so-creative nicknames you've got stored in that Neanderthal brain of yours. Just don't."

"Fine, Maria. Is that better?"

"No," she said, shaking her head. "You can call me Agent Hill."

"Fine, Agent Hill," he snapped. "I am trying to help you not come back from your first mission in a body bag. Will you please ignore the fact that you hate me for a few minutes so that you can hear what I'm actually saying?"

"I hear what you're saying," she returned. "You think that I'm not good enough to be your handler."

"No," Barton said, sighing and putting his hands on his hips as he looked up in to the sky. "That is not it. That's not it at all. I am saying you need to work harder. Yes, for an agent, you are in great shape, but that's not good enough in the field. Whatever the standard was before, it's not enough. You can't afford to get tired. You can't afford to miss a single shot. I am trying to help you. I am offering to help."

"Why do you care?"

"What, you think you'll be out there by yourself?" he asked in return. "Trust me, if you were going by yourself, I wouldn't care. Not even a little bit. But you're not going alone, are you? What happens to you, happens to me. The problems you have, are my problems. If we're going to work as a team, that's just how it is."

Maria said nothing, just dropped her head and stared at the ground as she mulled over what he was actually saying. Because, yes, maybe she hadn't heard him, not really. Maybe she had been a little too distracted by his attitude to listen.

"I know you probably thought being a handler would be about sitting in a room, making plans and listening in as other people carried them out," Clint continued after a minute more. "And yeah, mostly it will be. But things go bad. Things change and you have to be capable of changing with them. You have to be able to adapt, defend yourself, and run if needed. I can't make you take my advice. I can't make you take my help. But, you know what? I offered. Now... if something happens, well, I tried."

"What... what are you suggesting?"

"Run with me. Work out with me. Not all the time, I know you can't stand me, but a few times so I can give you some pointers."

"I can do that. What else?"

"The range. I hear you've made some progress and... yeah, I know our first lesson didn't go great. A lot of that is on me. But, if you're willing to give it another try..."

"I am," she answered.

"So am I," he said with a nod. "I'm there every morning. Whenever you want, stop by."

"Okay."

Clint nodded and Maria couldn't help but see that, while he didn't exactly look disappointed, he did look a little upset. Just a little. But, it was dark and she was probably imagining it. It wasn't that she thought he was incapable of emotion, but she hardly expected his feelings to be hurt over something as trivial as this.

"You really want this, don't you," he said, looking her square in the eyes.

"I do."

Clint gave her a tight smile and left the rest alone.


	5. Chapter 5

_**v.**_

It had become a regular thing; their routine. They did weight training in the gym three mornings a week. They did a five mile run, on varying paths, once a week with Agent Coulson joining them on occasion. And a few days each week she went to the range and they shot together, just never his bow. Clint wouldn't let her near his bow, which was okay with Maria, even if she sometimes asked just to get a rise out of him.

And honestly, she appreciated his help. Sometimes it felt like he was just trying to kill her slowly, especially during the runs, but she got it. She got his intent and Maria appreciated it.

Also a regular thing, although not technically a part of their routine, was Fridays.

Friday night, after duty, Clint would show up at the bar they all frequented, purposely sit nearby, order his two drinks, technically four, drink them straight away, and then proceed to spend the rest of the night getting on her nerves. Sometimes he only spent a few minutes telling some obvious bullshit story. Sometimes a few minutes was all it took for her to get supremely pissed off. On a few occasions they had actual discussions, some of which were surprisingly serious but he seemed to take some perverse pleasure in opposing whatever viewpoint she adopted. It was frustrating, and she imagined he meant it to be. Clint seemed to enjoy harassing her, and to be fair, Maria enjoyed a good argument. It was something she'd almost begun to look forward to.

There really was nothing else to do in town and so Maria was okay with it.

So, when she arrived at her usual time, ready to occupy her usual spot, she scanned the room and nearly froze in the doorway.

Clint was already there and he wasn't alone.

Shaking off the mild sense of disappointment she felt as Maria marched to the bar, she immediately set about pushing it from her mind. So what if he was already there and talking to another person who just-so-happened to be a woman. Or if the both of them seemed deeply absorbed in conversation and were sitting extremely close together with nothing but a bottle of vodka between them. It wasn't her business and it was about time he started bothering someone else.

"Hey," a man, some agent whose name she kept forgetting, said as he slid into the spot normally claimed by Clint. "Hill, right? Maria? You work with Coulson, don't you? I work with Danvers, so I have to ask... is Coulson as big of a pain in the ass as Danvers, or did you catch a break?"

Maria screwed up her face in annoyance, shaking her head and rolling her eyes.

"I've heard Coulson is like a cakewalk as far as leads go," the man rattled on, seemingly oblivious to her outright disgust. "I'm Garret, by the way. Paul Garret."

"Go away," Maria said, turning on the spot to face the other direction.

Agent Garret sat beside her for another minute or two more as Maria steadily ignored him before finally taking her advice, but it wasn't empty for long. Three more men each sat and tried to engage her attention, each more pathetic than the last, but none able to get more than a few words from her before giving up.

"Wow," a familiar voice said from beside her. "It's like a parade of the desperate and the hopeful. Sad really."

Maria chuckled as she swerved to face fellow agent, Karen Harper. Maria didn't know her very well, but she was still a welcome sight.

"All I want to do is have my drink and take a break but..." Maria said, ending with a sigh.

"You can't blame them, can you?" Harper laughed. "I mean, they've all been waiting for this chance."

"Oh, please," Maria returned divisively.

"I'm serious," Harper said with a chuckle. "I know you don't see them, you're too busy, but every Friday they're practically lined up, but Barton won't give them a chance."

"What do you mean?" Maria asked, as a sinking sensation in her stomach made her immediately regret asking that question.

"Come on," the other woman laughed, signaling the bartender for another drink. "You don't have to play dumb. We all know."

"Know what?" Maria asked, setting her own drink down and growing angry.

"No, no, I get it," Harper said, waving her off. "There are regulations. Got it. Nothing's going on," she finished with an exaggerated wink.

"Wait," Maria said sharply. "What are you saying? You don't think that Agent Barton and I..."

"Aren't you?" the other woman asked, raising her eyebrow and still looking doubtful. "And if you aren't, why aren't you?"

"Where do I begin? He's egotistical. Insubordinate. Immature. He thinks everything is a joke, including his job. He knows everything and he's never, ever, wrong."

"He's hot."

"Yes, well, he knows that too," Maria concluded.

"I'm not suggesting you marry him," Harper laughed. "I'm just saying..."

"No," Maria said emphatically shaking her head. "Ew. No. Just... he's probably got a different hook-up at every assignment. I'm not about to throw myself into his rotation."

After she said it, Maria casually looked over to the booth where Clint and his new friend were still holding court.

"Do you think Red there is in his rotation?" Harper asked.

"Don't know and don't care," Maria answered.

"I heard she's Coulson's other asset," Harper continued, lowering her voice and turning her eyes down towards her own drink.

Agent Coulson had briefed her that their section worked exclusively with two assets, Clint was obviously one of them and this woman must be the other, if Harper was to be believed. Maria had heard rumors that Coulson used to work with three assets, but there had been some kind of disagreement with how missions were to be accomplished. Maria didn't know any more than that and she didn't feel the need to know any more. Hearsay was notoriously unreliable.

"I mean it," Maria sighed. "I don't care who she is or who she works for."

"Even if it ends up being you?"


	6. Chapter 6

_**vi.**_

Red turned out to be Agent Natasha Romanoff, and the longer she stuck around the quieter the rumors about Maria and Clint became, because all anyone talked about was how obvious it was that Romanoff and Clint were hooking up.

They went everywhere together. They took their meals together. They were at the gym and the range together, although oddly enough, never when Maria showed up for what was still her routine with Clint.

There was talk that they even shared a room.

Maria ignored it.

She knew that stations, even SHIELD stations which were a lot like military bases, were like small towns. Everyone knew everyone else, and what they didn't really know, they made up. Jobs and assignments would always grow tedious, but gossip never would.

Still, she had to work with them.

"Sorry for the wait," Agent Coulson said as he entered the small conference room he'd set up for the morning. "Just finished up with Director Fury and our timeline has moved up. We need to go in and infiltrate Luchkov and his group as soon as possible."

"When do we leave?" Clint asked, inching forward in his chair.

"In a few months, tops," Agent Coulson answered, holding up a hand as he spoke. "There are still a few details to put into place, but there is no we this time, Clint. Just Natasha."

"Just Natasha?" Clint asked, shaking his head in disbelief. "No handler? No back-up? I thought I was going on this one?"

"Worried I'm going to show you up?" Agent Romanoff said with the hint of a smile.

"You walk in the room and show me up, Tasha," Clint returned with a wink. "That's not even a contest. I'm actually a little more concerned with the fact that this is the third assignment that was supposed to be mine, that's been reassigned or moved up or changed. What gives?"

"The objective has changed," Coulson answered.

"And you look horrible in heels," Romanoff added.

"So... I'm still benched?"

"No," Coulson answered. "Director Fury has a few things lined up for you."

"Fury?" Clint asked warily. "As in what exactly? Is he going to be my handler? What's..."

"Yes," Coulson answered, and Maria couldn't help but scowl. "For now, at least." He didn't say it, but it sounded like an apology.

Clint's first reaction was to look from Agent Coulson to Agent Romanoff, who quirked her eyebrow up in surprise.

"And what will I be doing?" Maria finally had to ask, because the three of them were practically ignoring her. "I thought I was supposed to be training as a field agent. As a handler."

"You are also going to be reassigned to Director Fury."

"But -"

"No, buts," Coulson said, interrupting her, but not unkindly. "Tasha, you want to go over these reports now or later?"

"Now's good," she said, getting up and following Agent Coulson out of the room without another word, leaving Clint and Maria still sitting at the table, looking dumbfounded.

After a few more minutes of steady silence, Clint finally got to his feet.

"I think we've been dumped."

"He can't do this," Maria said, getting to her feet and following Clint as he headed out the door. "He can't. Do you know how long I've worked and waited for this opportunity?"

"Oh, please," Clint said sarcastically as he pushed open a side door that led out onto a patio, "tell me all about it."

"This may be a joke to you, but to me it's serious," Maria snapped. "This is my career. I need time in the field. I needed this position and now what am I supposed to do? Be Fury's assistant? Go back to a desk?"

"I really wish you would."

"I'm going to have to talk to Director Fury," Maria said, not hearing him as she stopped. "This is unacceptable."

"Unacceptable? Are you kidding me?" Clint said, stopping in his tracks and wheeling back around towards her. "You've got the whole of SHIELD open to you. You could have your pick of any job you want, anywhere, and because you can't have this one, it's suddenly unacceptable?"

"What's your problem?" Maria snapped, not getting his sudden rage over her situation.

"I don't have a problem," he answered, evidentially trying to regain some control over his own emotions.

"Yes, you do," she pressed. "You've had a problem with me since the moment we met."

"Maybe."

"No, maybe. You have. You have, and for no reason."

"Oh, I have a reason," Clint bit back. "You and your career are my reason. Do you know how long it takes for a handler position to come open? It's like once every ten years."

"I know," she said, nodding her head to emphasize her point; her point being that it was a personal setback.

"No, you don't know," he said, angrier than before because of her response. "That was my position. Mine. I've been working for years to get that shot. And then they just gave it to you."

"How was that your position?"

Clint crossed his arms and took a deep breath in an attempt to calm himself down, but it wasn't doing much good.

"Was it promised to you?" Maria continued, angry at what he was implying. "How did that happen? What made it yours exactly?"

"It should have been mine."

"Then maybe you should have worked harder."

Clint gave her a smile, but it was so bitter she almost flinched in response, before turning and walking away. However, he didn't go far. After he'd gotten a few feet, he turned around and came back.

"Why do you even want to be a handler?" he asked quietly. "My handler. You don't like me. You don't respect me. Hell, I think the only person you have respect for is yourself. So why is this so important to you?"

"I need field work," she answered as if it should be obvious. "If I'm going to move up, I need to diversify my resume. I need experience in every aspect of SHIELD. Every position."

"So you're just ticking off a box?"

Maria didn't answer, because she didn't need to. Yes, she was. He knew that. Agent Coulson knew that. It was obvious.

"Do you know what options I have?" he asked, still speaking in a quiet, almost soft, tone. "There are two. Move up or move out. That's all I get. Assets become handlers or they become headstones. And the assets who do become handlers, stay handlers. There's no moving up after that for us. There's no career progression. Only one person I know of..." he started to correct himself, then stopped short again. "Doesn't matter. We're good enough to kill for SHIELD, and we're good enough to help the people who kill for SHIELD, but we're never good enough for anything else. We're never fully trusted."

"I..." Maria stammered, at a loss. She didn't know what to say. She hadn't realized. "I'm sorry."

"Don't apologize to me," he yelled. "I don't want your pity. I wanted a chance. Just one chance."

"Fine," she fired back at him. "But I didn't take it from you. I didn't do this to you. I didn't make that decision, someone else did. If you think I got this -"

"I know how you got this shot."

"Really?" she asked, just as angry as he was, if not more. Her whole life people, mostly men, had been telling her she'd had unfair advantages because she was a woman. Now she'd finally hear it from him, something Maria had been expecting since the first day they met. "And how was that?"

"Because you're tenacious and driven and smart," he answered, still practically yelling but catching her completely by surprise. "I've read your file. I know you've worked hard for this, I've even helped you do it and... you'd do a good job," he said, starting to deflate. "Maybe even a great job. But it still pisses me off. And it doesn't matter anyway, it's gone."

"Agent Coulson didn't say that," Maria reasoned, having an easier time focusing on the last part of what he'd said than anything else. "He just said -"

"He said we're reporting to Fury," Clint interrupted, "which means you're being groomed to be his assistant. His right hand. You'll be deputy director in five years. Three if I know you at all. Can't progress much higher than that."

"You think that's what this is?"

"Of course it is," Clint sighed, shaking his head. "They have great things planned for you, Maria. A real future."

Maria couldn't help but smile. She smiled and hoped he was right. It would make some sense, she certainly was qualified. She could live with not getting the chance to be in the field as a handler if this was the alternative.

"Congratulations," he said, dropping his eyes and give her a quick nod before he turned to go.

"Wait," she called after him. "What about you? You're reporting to Fury, too. You never know."

"I do know," he said, shaking his head. "It's a title change. I'll be part of a security detail or some other fancy term... probably a bodyguard or personal security, something like that, but it'll still be the same job. Only instead of going after people and taking them down, I'll be taking them down when they come to us. Doesn't matter."

Maria had wanted to object, to tell him that it did, but he left before she got the chance.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes: **Quick thing, thank you all so much for the great reviews and for following this story. I hope you like where it's going and where it ends up! I had a lot of fun writing it and I'm really enjoying hearing what everyone thinks about it. So, thank you!

* * *

_**vii.**_

Within a week they'd both been reassigned to a larger station, the one Director Fury preferred to work from. Maria didn't see Clint very much after that. Not at first. He was certainly around, and he was being kept busy, same as she was, but he stopped speaking to her altogether. Occasionally he'd dip his head when passing her in the hallway, but it never went any further.

Other than that, Maria had no reason to complain.

Not that that was something she would complain about.

Clint didn't have to talk to her or acknowledge her or anything at all. She didn't care. But, she also didn't know anyone but him and no one else had been exactly welcoming. Maria had jumped into a position that this time hadn't been coveted by just one person, but by literal dozens.

It didn't bother her. Her job, her profession, and really her life, had never been about making friends. It was something she'd accepted early on. It was the price she had to pay to get what she wanted.

Maria tried to not let it bother her.

She was quickly finding her rhythm in her new surroundings and Director Fury began giving her more to do There were so many programs, so much happening, it was sometimes hard to grasp the overall picture. The only thing that was perfectly obvious was that the work they were overseeing was classified and potentially dangerous. And above even those two caveats, the work being overseen was coveted.

She'd just sat down for the night, had just been starting to unlace her boots, when her communicator buzzed.

"Hill," Fury barked from the other end of the line, "find Barton. Perimeter alarm has gone off line again and no one has seen him."

"Yes, sir," she said, grumbling after they'd been disconnected that she wasn't Clint's babysitter. They'd axed that position.

After poking around a few of his usual haunts, and asking a few very unhelpful agents if they'd seen Clint anywhere, Maria headed outside the building and into the courtyard. She felt like she was on a snipe hunt. She was tired and annoyed and mentally cursing not just Fury and Clint, but the IT department who probably caused the glitch in the system that had set them all on alert; the damn thing had been doing it all week.

After a brisk walk around the courtyard, which was completely deserted, Maria decided to walk the fence line, reasoning that if Clint was anywhere, he'd be out there if an alarm had been tripped.

It took awhile, but after a good ten minutes of scanning the treetops, she finally spotted him.

"I see you, Barton," she called up to him. "Play time is over."

"Took you long enough," he yelled back down to her as he moved from branch to branch.

"I was stalling," she lied. "I didn't want to hurt your feelings, but I saw you as soon as I passed the fence line."

"Did you now?"

"Yes."

Clint laughed as he dropped his bag to the ground, just ready to jump the last part himself. "But you didn't see me on the roof? Following you? I've been following you since you came out the back entrance. Right over there," he said, pointing the very door she had exited from.

Maria fixed him with a stare and he finally laughed again, louder this time, at her puzzled expression. And then she got it. He hadn't followed her, but he had been watching her long enough to catch her in a lie.

"Funny," she said with a shake of her head. "Fine, I didn't see you at first, but you really weren't that hard to spot."

"Because I wasn't trying very hard," he answered.

"Whatever," she sighed, watching as he finally jumped down from the tree and began to walk her way. "Director Fury is looking for you. Hurry up."

"And you're his messenger?"

"Just get your ass inside and do your job," she sighed. "Perimeter tripped again."

"Why do you think I'm out here?"

"What? Are we under attack?"

"If we were, I'm so glad they sent you. Did you even bring a weapon?"

Maria looked momentarily guilty, because she had not brought her gun. She hadn't even thought to bring her gun. These damn alarms had been going off at all hours, all week, and were driving everyone nuts.

Everyone except Clint and Fury which suddenly gave her pause.

"You're setting these off," she said with a rueful shake of her head. "Son of a bitch, why didn't I see that sooner?" Clint just smiled at her, like the freaking cat who ate the canary. "Yeah, I'm sure this is fun for you," she said dryly.

"Kind of," he admitted.

"What... what's this for? What's the point? The alarms work. Great. We know that."

"Yes, and now we also know that if a few..."

"A few?" she questioned, talking right over him.

"...false alarms go off, everyone thinks every alarm is fake. And they stop reacting. Even you, which, honestly... I'm disappointed. I thought you were better than that."

"Sure you did."

"Here," he said, his words clipped and fast, as he simultaneously drew his sidearm from its holster and tossed it at her.

As she was in the process of catching it, he was already swinging his bow off his shoulder and fletching an arrow.

Without thinking, without hesitating, she drew on him.

"What the fuck, Barton?" she snapped, as they stared one another down from their different sights.

"Wow, you did listen to me," he laughed, finally lowering his bow. "Never let your guard down. Good. That's... that's really good."

Maria was a little slower to lower her gun, mostly out of shock. He hadn't been lying to her when he'd said that assets weren't generally trusted by the rest of SHIELD's agents. It was all she'd heard from the people around her, at least the ones that would talk to her. There were many stories about assets going rogue.

"Now give me back my gun," he said, holding out his hand.

"No," she said, placing it in her own, previously empty, side holster.

"Fun time's over," he said, more seriously than before but still keeping his tone light. "Come on. That's my gun. May I please, Agent Hill, have it back?" he tacked on sarcastically.

"Shouldn't have given it to me," she shrugged, turning to go.

"I didn't give it to you," Clint said, jogging a few steps to catch up.

"Possession is nine-tenths of the law."

"Oh, I see," he said with a smirk. "You want me to wrestle it away from you. I get that. I get that a lot actually, which I guess you've heard, but I'm on duty, Hill. And, as much as I love a bit of danger with my foreplay, a loaded gun is even too far for me. So, just hand it over, and later you can stop by my quarters and I'll see if I can't oblige you."

"You're unbelievable."

"Oh, so you have heard."

"Does this actually ever work with anyone? Ever?" she asked, still walking back towards the compound. "Because you're really not that cute."

"It's not about being cute, it's about confidence," he returned, completely unfazed by her put down.

"Arrogance," she muttered under her breath, and to her annoyance, he laughed.

"Maybe a little," he admitted. "And yeah, it does work. Granted, not with someone like you. But I can't imagine anything I'd say would work on you."

"It would not," she concurred.

"Because I'm not your type."

"No, you are not," she agreed.

"And," he said, placing his palm flat against the door she had almost opened and stopping her in her tracks.

"And what?" she asked, tired and ready to get back inside.

"What is your type?" he asked quietly, just on the edge of crowding her personal space. A hint of a smile still on his lips and his eyes, his eyes were locked on hers intently until...

Maria saw it. She caught him momentarily shift his gaze from her eyes to her lips. She saw it and her own breath suddenly caught in her throat. She didn't know what to say or do. More to the point she didn't know what she wanted to say or do. The thought of just stepping into him, of closing the gap between them, felt both foolish and exciting.

Before she had a chance to make a huge mistake, the door banged open and there was Director Fury, glowering at them from the doorway.

"I see you've found Agent Barton. Congratulations."

Maria shifted uneasily, not certain how to take that remark, but Clint didn't even hesitate.

"Yes, sir," he answered for her. "Agent Hill was the only one to take it upon herself to patrol the perimeter. No one else left the compound."

"Thompsen? Davies? No one else tried to find you?" Fury clarified, and Maria began to put the pieces together. They'd all been sent out to investigate and locate Clint, and she...

"No one," Barton confirmed. "She even came armed. Got the drop on me and everything."

"Did she now?" Fury said dryly, and Maria could tell he didn't believe that for a single second.

"Well sir, I had a gun," Maria answered, if not exactly true at first, it was now.


	8. Chapter 8

_**viii.**_

Maria and Clint had gone back to their routine of hitting the gym together, running, and training on the range, but it was different somehow. Their relationship, for a lack of a better word, was less antagonistic and more companionable.

It was easier.

And they didn't flirt, no matter what anyone else said. Or at least, she didn't flirt with him.

Maria still wasn't sure exactly what that had been that night, but it wasn't flirting, not on her part. She'd discovered that that was simply Clint. It was like he didn't know how to turn it off or censor himself.

She was okay with it.

Maria imagined he must be a little lonely. She hadn't thought it was possible at first, but the more they talked and were around one another, the more she realized that the only other people she'd ever seen him with were Agent Coulson and Agent Romanoff, neither of whom were on station with them. And maybe exasperating the situation was the fact that the only person Maria talked to at all was Clint. No one else had exactly warmed up to her, which was no surprise.

She was a little lonely herself.

To combat that feeling they brought another thing back into their routine: Friday nights. It was the one night a week she allowed herself to unwind a little, and if not literally, figuratively let her hair down. This was something Clint not only encouraged, but had begun to absolutely insist on. He really didn't have to try very hard. Maria enjoyed their trips off station together to the various bars and clubs in the area.

"Do you know what I want to know about you?" Clint asked her, late Friday night as they sat across from one another in a booth in the very back of the club they'd gone to for drinks.

"I swear to God, Barton, if this is about the color of my panties again..."

"No, no, no," he laughed. "They're green. I'm actually being serious. This is an actual question."

"I have a few for you now, too."

"Later," he said after he took another sip from his glass. "What I want to know is why on Earth you'd want to be in SHIELD? How did that even happen?"

Maria, not too long ago, would have taken offense to that question. She'd have thought he was implying she wasn't good enough to be there, but now she knew otherwise.

"I was actually approached when I was in the military," she answered, "but I had other plans for my life. I liked the idea of what SHIELD was, what they did; I just thought it was more important to get my degree first. So, when I had finished with school, I called up the agent who had contacted me before and... here I am."

"That's it?"

"Yeah," she laughed. "It's not as exciting of a story as yours but..."

"Well, I guess they can't shoot all of their recruits," he replied. Maria didn't mean to do it, but she giggled. "Yes, I know... you're all for me getting shot at."

"I'm not," Maria argued. "But... I just have to know now, for myself, why would you join an organization that had you shot?"

"I'm a masochist?" Clint said with a shrug, continuing on only after it was clear she wasn't going to stand for that answer. "I don't know. I didn't really have a lot of choice. I mean, I suppose they could have just killed me then and there, but they didn't so... here I am."

"You really think they would have killed you?"

Again, Clint shrugged. It was his way of dismissing the topic, but it didn't sit easy with Maria.

Luckily, the waitress returned and saved them from further discussion.

"How are you doing, Honey?" she asked, angling her whole body towards Clint the same way she'd been doing all night, Maria noticed. "Need a refill?"

"I think we could go one more round," he answered, giving her a wink in return.

"You've got it," the waitress returned, all smiles as she went back to the bar.

"You're incorrigible," Maria laughed as soon as the other woman was out of earshot.

"I like people."

"You like women," she corrected.

"I do," he admitted with a smirk. "I can't help it. She's cute. She's got a nice smile."

"That wasn't her smile you were looking at," she fired back at him, amused to see him at least look a little chagrined. "Do you want me to go so that the two of you can be alone? I can do that."

"No," he said sincerely. "I'm not that bad, am I? Besides, we came here together."

"This isn't a date, Barton."

"I know that, Hill," he returned, mimicking her tone. "That doesn't mean I can ditch you. That's bad form."

"But I'm giving you permission."

"Stop trying to get me laid," Clint said, trying to sound firm but unable to keep a completely straight face. "I can take care of myself, thanks."

"Are you sure because..." Maria said, trailing off with a too-knowing smile.

"Is that what we're doing now?" he asked, smiling back at her. "Setting each other up, because I can do that. Easy," he finished, taking a quick look around the room. "That guy. Right there. How about I bring him over..."

"No," she said with a loud laugh.

"...I'll introduce the two of you..."

"This is not funny," Maria tried to interject, but she couldn't stop laughing.

"...and you can just see where the night takes you," he finished.

"Absolutely not."

"What? Not your type?"

"No. He is not."

"So..."

"I'm not telling you that," she said quickly.

"Why won't you tell me your type?" he asked, leaning forward across the table.

"Because it's such a ridiculous question."

"Is it?"

"God, Barton... sometimes I don't know what to think about you..."

"But you're thinking about me."

"Shut up," she said, feeling herself beginning to blush under his gaze and thankful for the waitress coming back when she did.

"Here we go," the other woman said with a smile as she set down fresh drinks.

"Thank you," Clint said, briefly taking his eyes off of Maria. "I think this is it for us tonight."

"I'll be back with your check then," she returned, looking slightly disappointed.

Maria watched her go before turning back to Clint and shaking her head.

"Unbelievable."

They ended up walking back to clear their heads. Maria had three drinks instead of her allotted maximum of two and had stopped counting Clint's drinks altogether after a certain point. They'd cleared the gate, no problem; Maria was always impressed at how, no matter how much he'd drank, Clint could pull himself together and act presentable for the guards at the front gate. She sometimes struggled with that and had learned to just let him do the talking.

Once back in the compound, it became obvious that Clint didn't want to head back inside just yet. Not overly tired, and having a slow schedule lined up for the next day, Maria continued to walk with him without any real direction in mind.

"I have to know," Maria said after a good solid fifteen minutes of increasingly brooding silence, "what would you have liked to have done?"

"What do you mean?" Clint asked, still sounding a bit distracted.

"With your life? You know," she prodded, "if..."

"If I hadn't been a complete disaster in the making?" he returned, trying to sound as if he was joking. "I don't know. I honestly try not to think about it."

"But..."

"But what?"

"You're not happy here," she finished, figuring she might as well.

"I'm not unhappy."

"That's a ringing endorsement," Maria snarked, and to her relief Clint laughed.

"I don't want to sound... ungrateful," Clint finally continued. "SHIELD has done a lot of good things for me but I'm not naive. I know how this works. And I know I've got to stay useful to stay around."

"You're useful."

"Thanks," he said with a snicker, "but lately... I've got myself a reputation as a reluctant assassin. That's why I'm here. That's why I keep getting shuffled off of missions. I'm not like Natasha. She can get in close. She can get information out of anyone. She doesn't need to kill every time. I'm expected to because... because that's all I do. But I don't any more so now... now I'm a problem. They don't know what to do with me and I don't know what to do with myself."

"I'm sorry I took your job."

"You didn't," he said, shaking his head and giving her a wan smile. "It was a long shot anyway. They weren't going to give it to me; it was wishful thinking. And it's not like I'm not still gainfully employed. I'll make do. I always do."

Maria looked at him, really looked at him and could see Clint was trying to pass it off, but that the disappointment over the loss was still there. It may not have been his dream job that he'd missed out on, but it had been something.

"Do you know what I wanted to be when I was growing up?"

"An accountant?" he guessed.

"No," she said with a shake of her head. "I wanted to be a dog washer."

"What?" he said, stopping in his tracks and grinning at her.

"I did," Maria laughed. "I was in the third grade and we had to do this big presentation in front of our class, and our parents, on what kind of job we wanted when we were adults. And I was very specific. I didn't want to be a groomer or a handler or even a trainer, I just wanted to wash the dogs. That was it. And, as you can imagine, I went all out. I could never do anything halfway. I had a backboard with painstakingly drawn pictures of how I imagined my business would be. I wrote three pages and made charts; I'm sure I talked way longer than I was supposed to. I even borrowed my neighbors Barbie doll set to give a practical demonstration. I was so excited. I thought it was such a great job that everyone would want to do it."

"So why aren't you washing dogs now?" he asked, laughing a bit along with her.

"You know how kids are," she answered. "Growing up everything looks like more fun than it is. The world is this perfect, exciting place where you get to make your own choices and be... well, anything. I mean, when you're a kid, the only thing you ever really want is to be an adult. Right? You don't think about the bigger things."

"I guess," he said quietly, dropping his eyes and sounding like he wanted to understand her, but didn't. Before Maria could turn the conversation back to him though, Clint changed his tone and pressed on. "But what changed your mind? You had graphs and data and I'm sure market research or something... What happened? Was your presentation so good that one of the teachers stole your idea and ran with it?"

"No," she laughed, momentarily letting his quiet dejection momentarily slide. "It just wasn't very... realistic. My father sat me down and explained that to me afterwards. He is a very pragmatic man. He said I was too smart to waste myself that way, but what he really meant was that I'd embarrassed him." Clint nodded at her, and before she realized what he was doing, he'd also thrown his arm around Maria's shoulder and briefly squeezed her close. "What I took away from that wasn't that I was smarter or more talented than anyone else. Or that my dream job, you know, at eight," she added with a slight laugh, "wasn't worth doing. I guess I learned that my dreams were unimportant," she said after a pause. "And they were to him. To him what I wanted was never as important as the things he wanted and that hasn't changed. It took me a long time to realize that, but when I did... once I did, I stopped thinking of the things I wanted as wishful thinking or day dreaming. I stopped thinking that they were nonsense because not everyone understood them. It's not. If you want something, you have to make it happen. No matter how ridiculous it may sound to anyone else."

"Even if it sounds ridiculous to me?" Clint asked her seriously.

"Especially if it sounds ridiculous to you," Maria returned.


	9. Chapter 9

_**ix.**_

Maria paced the room and silently swore that she'd never wish for another field assignment ever again.

It was only meant to be a quick hit. Director Fury had sent Maria and Clint on special assignment for a week, tops, to take care of a minor threat before it became a major one. To his credit, Clint didn't drag it out even though he regularly complained about being insanely bored back at station. It was their third day there and he'd confirmed that he was going in that night. He could have taken longer to do it, but there was no point.

They had a mission and it had to be done.

It hadn't been entirely bad, so far it had been much easier than she'd imagined it would be. They worked very well together. He was a little short, at times, with her; a tad impatient when they communicated over the radio, but she knew he had a very specific way of doing things and her job was to let him do it.

Maria just wished she could talk to him now; the waiting was awful.

At just after three in the morning there was a bang on the door of the cabin they'd been using as a safe house.

Maria drew her weapon and took a steadying breath before opening the door, but the gun was unnecessary. Clint practically dropped into her arms, throwing down his bag with one hand and slamming the door shut with the other.

"Sorry I'm late," he said, as she helped him to the nearest chair. "Didn't exactly go as planned but... it's done."

Maria looked on, almost in shock over his appearance.

Clint was white as a sheet underneath all the blood he was covered in. There was a gash, high on his forehead, and several long scratches down his arms. His shirt and pants were torn and he looked beaten and bruised.

"How's our cover?" he asked, finally spurring her into action.

"Good," she said, taking out the first aid kit and stopping, unsure what to do next.

"Shower first," he said, waving her off and attempting to get back on his feet. "It looks worse than it is."

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah," he said as he slowly moved towards the bathroom. "Let me shower and change and you can call for our pick-up. After that you can try your hand at sutures. I'm sure that'll look great on your resume."

Maria knew he was joking, but was having a hard time finding anything funny about the situation. Sensing that, Clint continued on into the bathroom without another word and within a few minutes she heard the shower start.

Half an hour later he emerged, not looking great, but at least clean, having patched a few of his cuts himself, and unsurprisingly only wearing his underwear. Clint didn't seem to know the definition of the word modesty.

"When's our flight?" he asked, sitting on the bed and dropping his head into his hands.

"Tomorrow after midnight."

Clint nodded his head just enough so that she knew he'd heard, but remained silent.

"Are you hungry?" she asked, really not sure what to do with herself.

In her head this had all played out differently. Even knowing Clint as well as she imagined she was ever going to know him, she thought that after a mission he'd be more animated or excitable. Relieved even, she wasn't sure. Maria hadn't expected him to be dejected, which was the only word she could think of to describe his current state. He looked completely dejected.

But given all she did know about him, maybe that made sense.

"Do you need medical?" she asked, having gotten no response from her last question.

"It's all... it's all superficial. I'm fine."

"Do you want to talk about it?"

"We can do the debrief later."

"That's not..." she stammered, finally getting his attention. "I wasn't talking about the debrief. I just wanted to know if you needed to talk."

Clint held out his hand to her by way of an invitation and Maria was surprised by how easy it was to reach out and take it. As soon as their hands locked, he pulled her close and wrapped his arms around her waist, resting his cheek against her stomach and exhaling.

It was absolutely raw need.

Maria could sense it in him. It was a physical need, an ache, to just be close to another person. Any person. Maria couldn't lie to herself about that. Clint had certainly flirted with her before, had jokingly confessed an attraction and even shown a real attraction to her a few times, but it was nothing like this. She could be anyone in the world and he'd have still clung to her like a lifeline.

He was shaking.

"It's over," she found herself whispering as she ran her hands through his hair, gently tipping his head up to look him in the eyes. "It's over. It's done."

"It shouldn't have happened that way," he confessed. "It shouldn't have."

"What happened?" she asked quietly.

Clint tried to turn his head away from her, tried to avert his eyes, but Maria held him firmly in place.

"I thought... I thought I had my shot lined up. I did have it lined up. I was just waiting for the guy to be alone and then... The problem was he kept moving. I should have known something was up when he kept moving from room to room. Upstairs. Downstairs. He wouldn't sit still. I had to keep shifting around with him and that should have clued me in but I guess I really am thickheaded because now it's pretty obvious that they had me pegged early on."

Maria didn't say anything. He only needed her to listen, even if he didn't realize it. Clint had to get this all said.

"Finally," he continued after a long break, "I went back to the roof and decided to stay there... I should never have left the damn roof in the first place. I heard the guys coming. They were trying to sneak up on me but they were so loud. It gave me enough time to think, to plan, and I could have ran. I could have abandoned the mission and left it to someone else to do later. Maybe I should have. I don't know."

"Why didn't you?" she asked before she came up with the answer on her own.

"To prove I still could," he answered with a small shrug, like maybe he wasn't entirely sure himself. "This guy, you know what he is, Maria. You know what he does. I'm not sorry for doing my job, I'm just... it shouldn't have happened the way it did. I don't know how I expected it would go any other way. I put up a decent fight, but I let them catch me. I let them take me in and pretended they had the control."

"You should have radioed me," Maria said with a shudder as she shook her head.

"I had it," Clint returned, dropping his eyes from her and instantly she knew, if Coulson had been on the other end, this wouldn't even be a discussion. Clint would have called Coulson. "They didn't want me dead, they wanted information. They wanted to know who I was and who I worked for so they took me right where I needed to be but... instead one now, there were three and..."

He couldn't finish but she thought she knew the answer to that as well.

There was a reason Clint worked as a sniper. He didn't like to be up close and personal. He tried not to make it personal. These were very bad people and killing them was his job but that was easier said than done; and it was easier done from a distance.

"You did what you had to do," she said quietly.

"Did I?"

The look in his eyes was all she needed to know it was true, and he'd been in a situation, contrived or not, where it would have been his life or theirs. Maria wasn't sorry for what he'd done, she'd read the file on the guy same as Clint had; she was only sorry about the toil it was taking on him now. And in that moment she understood why most of SHIELD's handlers had once been assets. It was because they understood. They understood what the other person was going through, especially in the aftermath, in ways no one else could. Maria certainly couldn't, but she was going to try.

For Clint, she was going to try.

She didn't answer him, Maria didn't get the chance. Before she could say any more words of comfort or assurance, Clint must have read something in her eyes, the same as she'd read in his. Some bit of compassion.

Something close to passion.

Maybe she leaned into him a little bit, but he definitely moved up to her, their mouths meeting somewhere in the middle. It wasn't sweet, or shy, or tentative, like a first kiss could be, Clint's lips moved over hers with wanton need, as his hands slipped up her back, holding her as close as he could. Maria tipped her head to the side, her hands still pulling through his hair as the kiss between them deepened and intensified.

Unexpectedly, he pulled back, but there was a smile on his lips as he dropped his head and gave it a shake.

"I'm sorry," he said quickly, looking embarrassed by his own behavior. "I shouldn't have done that. That was... that wasn't appropriate. That was... that was..."

Maria nodded along with him, numb. It wasn't appropriate, Clint was right, but at the moment she didn't care. She only cared that he finally stopped looking so broken. She only cared that he was back and safe and alive. That he was here with her.

Clint looked at Maria and saw it, again, that concern and, again, leaned up and pressed his lips to hers. There was no hesitation on Maria's behalf this time. This time she matched his enthusiasm with her own, moving closer as she simultaneously pulled him into her arms.

"We shouldn't do this," he murmured against her lips in between kisses. "We really need to stop."

"You're right," she replied, but without letting go. "You are. We..."

"We should sleep," Clint said with a sigh, gently taking her hands in his and removing them from where they'd been around his neck and holding them gently in his own. "We should just... We should get some sleep."

"Okay," she answered, trying to regain her breath and stop her body from flushing red. "That's... no, yeah. Sleep. You should sleep," Maria continued, dropping his hands and clasping her own together. "I'll just... I'll check on..."

"No," he said, protesting her movement and pulling her back to him, his hands tugging on her hips. "Stay. Can't you just... I don't want you breaking protocol or whatever for me but..."

"I think we kind of already broke protocol," she said, finally relaxing into a smile.

"Yeah, so, why stop there?" he asked, swinging his legs up onto the bed and scooting over to make space for her.

Maria didn't have to ask if he was serious, she knew Clint was, but it didn't stop her from a sudden bout of unexplainable nerves. All things considered, this was not a good idea. It had gone far enough. Too far. It was time to stop this nonsense and remember that they were there on business.

"I promise," he said, sensing her reluctance, "just sleep. I just... I'd like it if you would stay beside me for a little while. Please."

She nodded and her nervousness evaporated, but she was still on edge. Maria was still entirely too keyed up for sleep, even if he was clearly exhausted and wasn't just using sleep as a euphemism or an opportunity for something more. And she wasn't entirely convinced that this wasn't a continuation of an already bad idea, but found she couldn't say no. Clint still needed someone, anyone to hold on to and keep him sane, and Maria was going to be there for him.

"Wait, just... wait," she said, heading into the other room where she double checked the lock on the door and ensured a weapon was still within reach. She returned quickly to the room with her communicator, which she placed on the nightstand, and a book. Clint looked amused, but didn't object. He just watched and waited, as she propped herself up beside him and got situated, before dropping his head onto her lap and shutting his eyes.

Without thinking about it, she rested her free hand on his temple. He had the softest hair. It was the only thing she could focus on. Every word on the page before her was a blur.

"Is this the secret of a good handler?" she asked quietly after his breath grew steadily softer.

"Don't tell Phil I gave it away," he whispered back to her in the semi-darkness.

Maria smiled as Clint drifted off to sleep.


	10. Chapter 10

_**x.**_

The after report had been brutal. Clint spent two weeks completing psych evaluations before finally showing up one morning at Director Fury's daily briefings, evidentially cleared for work. Maria also had some psych exams, but hers were far less scrutinizing. Not once did she find it necessary to bring up exactly what had happened after Clint had completed his part of their mission. That kiss was no one's business but theirs. Neither was the fact that they'd spent the night in bed together or that Clint had woken up sobbing. Still, as quiet as she'd been on the matter, most of the details about the actual hit had gotten out anyhow.

No one blamed her, carrying out the mission was Clint's job.

Well, almost no one blamed her.

Three days after they arrived back at the station Maria received an angry phone call from the other side of the globe complements of a very pissed off Agent Natasha Romanoff.

The day after that Agent Phil Coulson had shown up in person at her office and demanded an explanation.

She didn't have one.

Maria suspected Clint told them to back-off, because not long after that Agent Coulson stopped by again and even apologized. Agent Romanoff never did, but she didn't call back either to continue her ranting. Plus she was on assignment.

Maria, for her part, was mostly trying to forget about it. All of it. She could see now that she wasn't cut out for hardcore field work. It was too emotionally taxing. Plus, she was happy where she was, which might actually be a first. She liked learning about command and control, about operations. She liked overseeing projects and orchestrating missions. She liked being in charge. And mostly she liked the sense of accomplishing something productive, even if she sometimes didn't exactly agree with what was being produced.

She'd decided that if Director Fury asked her to sit in as a handler for another mission, Maria would say no.

If Clint asked...

"Good morning."

"Morning," Maria said in return without looking up for the screen before her, his entrance momentarily startling her out of her own thoughts.

Clint slid into the room and shut the door behind him before slinking into the chair set before her desk.

"Do you know what I hate about this assignment?" he asked after a few minutes of silence.

"I'm kind of busy here, Barton."

"How completely pointless it is," he answered regardless. "Think about it. I'm providing security to Director Fury. Nick Fury. I think, if anything, he should be protecting me."

"That doesn't sound like you," Maria said, shutting down the file she'd been trying to read and looking up at him.

Clint still looked bad. He was still bruised. Mostly, she knew, it had been his ego that had taken a hit.

Maybe something deeper than that.

Gossip was vicious.

"I'm fine."

"Didn't see you on the range this morning," she pushed. "Thought that was the first place you'd go after you were cleared."

"No, the first place I went was to Fury's office. Then his meeting. And now I'm here."

"What? You want to be my bodyguard now?"

"Does it need guarding?" he asked with a grin.

"Now that sounds like you," she laughed as she got to her feet and picked up her workbook.

"Are you kicking me out?" he asked as he also got to his feet and met her at the door.

"I've got a meeting," she answered as she placed her hand on the doorknob, ready to go. "You'll have to come by and be obnoxious later."

"Wait a minute," he said, placing his hand gently over hers and applying just enough pressure to keep the door from opening. "I stopped by to say thank you."

It was like the air had gotten thinner. Maria suddenly had a hard time catching her breath as Clint continued to look at her so sincerely. And she knew it was an act, or that it was at least part of his act. When he wanted, he could turn on the charm, she just didn't see why he felt it was necessary to always being doing that with her.

"You don't have to."

"I realize that," he said with a quirk of his lips, "but I wanted to. And not just for..." he trailed off, and for a moment seemed genuinely embarrassed. "You could have put it in the report and you didn't so... thank you."

"Well then, you're welcome," she said, looking down and somewhat surprised to find that he was no longer just resting his hand on hers, but holding it. That she was holding his hand.

"Listen," he started to say, taking a half step closer so that he was practically a breath away.

"Stop it," she snapped, wrenching her hand free and backing away. "What happened, happened, but that doesn't mean... it means nothing. Nothing."

Before he had a chance to respond, just as her words had registered across his features, the door opened on them and there was Director Fury.

"I'm not interrupting, am I?" he asked, eyeing them both suspiciously.

"No, sir," Maria answered, the first to recover. "I was just on my way to see you."

"Agent Barton?" Fury said, turning to him for his explanation.

"Sir?"

"Uh, huh," the other man responded. "Well, whatever it is you're doing here, you saved me the trouble of tracking you down. Both of you, follow me."

As Fury turned to go, Clint fell in right beside him, and Maria couldn't help but feel he'd done it on purpose so that she'd have no choice but to trail behind them both.

In typical fashion, Fury didn't say a word to either of them until they'd arrived at his office and the door was secured.

Fury sat.

Both Maria and Clint remained on their feet.

"Your clearances have come through," he said after a brief pause.

Maria's eyes darted towards Clint, a reaction he must have fought because the only acknowledgement Clint made at all was a slight dip of his head.

"You'll need to be brought up to speed," he continued, undisturbed by their almost complete lack of reaction. "My briefing room has been set up and you'll find dossiers with everything you'll need to know."

Still, neither of them spoke. Neither of them knew what to say.

"Do you have any idea at all what I'm talking about?" Fury asked.

"No, sir," the both said at the once.

"Well, at least some things are still a secret around here," he sighed in response. "Which reminds me, Agent Barton, we will find out who leaked information from your classified report. And they will be handled."

"Thank you."

"This program," Fury said, getting to his feet and already in motion with Maria and Clint following on instinct, "is our highest priority. You'll be two of only a handful of agents who are completely read on, who will be allowed to know everything about it. Agent Hill, you'll be assisting me with the operational side. You'll be there, overseeing things when I cannot be. When you speak, it's my voice you'll be using. Understood."

"Yes, sir," she answered as the three of them came to a stop just outside the briefing room Fury had mentioned before.

"Agent Barton, you'll be in charge of security and any tactical operations that come up, as they always do. You'll be personally responsible for checking and clearing all individuals assigned, no matter how small their part. I want you to know them in and out, backwards and forward. Think you can handle that?"

"Yes," Clint answered, and Maria didn't stop herself this time from actually looking his way. It was the first time she'd ever heard him excited about an assignment. "Yes, sir," he said, correcting himself quickly, stamping that emotion down. "I can do that."

Director Fury gave him a crisp nod before rapping on the door once and cracking it open. "Are you ready?"

"I am," came a familiar voice, and Maria saw Clint actually smile as soon as he saw Agent Coulson waiting for them inside the briefing room.

Maria may have even smiled herself.

"I leave you to it," Fury said and with that was gone.

"Have a seat," Coulson said, indicating the two spots already set up with notebooks for their use.

"Is Tasha in on this too?" Clint asked.

"She is fully briefed," Coulson answered with a smile.

"I knew the two of you weren't telling me something," Clint said, but he didn't sound upset by it.

"Well, I'm sure you'll understand why. You were supposed to be brought on at the same time Natasha was," Coulson went on to explain, "but there were complications with your background check."

"Meaning a former Russian spy is easier to trace than an American born orphan?" Clint asked.

"Surprisingly, yes," Coulson answered truthfully.

"And were there complications with my background check?" Maria asked.

"No," Coulson answered. "Yours was started later, that's all."

Maria nodded as Clint stifled a laugh.

"What's so funny?" she asked.

"The idea that you have some kind of dark and seedy past," he answered, his voice uncharacteristically full of venom. "Come on, Phil. What they get on her? Unpaid parking tickets? Jaywalking? Did she shoplift some candy as a kid? I have to know."

"Later, Barton," Coulson said, only slightly exasperated and already pulling up his presentation on the projector. "We've got a lot of ground to cover."

Agent Coulson hadn't been exaggerating. Maria and Clint listened as he explained everything they knew about the Tesseract and everything they were doing with it. It was staggering and overwhelming and by the end of the day, neither of them were hardly talking. They'd both resorted to taking notes and nodding, repeating information over and over again with Agent Coulson and one another, and even forgetting they were kind of in the middle of a fight.

There was so much work for them to do and the briefing wasn't even finished.

All said it took three days to pour through everything on just a superficial level.

At the end of Agent Coulson's massive lecture, because it stopped being a real briefing halfway through the first day, Maria felt like she knew what she was getting into but was apprehensive just the same.

"We meet three times a week," Coulson said after a lengthy pause. "You'll both be officially stationed here, but unofficially arrangements have been made for you at the project's station. Barton, you'll report to me. Hill, you'll report to Director Fury.

Maria couldn't help but smile, it was a serious move up for her, doubts or no doubts. This whole project, it could be very good. She was excited. She couldn't help but be excited, even if she had mountains of work to do. Even if it meant continuing to work with Clint directly, which might prove awkward.

She gave him a glance to see if she could gage his reaction, but as usual, he'd hidden it away. Clint didn't look excited any more, or tired, or anything really.

Just ready.

"When do we see it?" Clint asked, tossing his pen onto the pad and rubbing his eyes.


	11. Chapter 11

_**xi.**_

For another two weeks, she didn't see him.

Despite the fact that their offices were practically side by side, that they were living a hallway apart, and that they were working on the exact same project, Maria didn't see Clint for the first two weeks anywhere.

She didn't know how he was ducking out of Fury's meetings so effectively, but no one ever questioned his absence. She also didn't know how he had managed to scare the shit out of everyone on the program without being around, but he had.

The things Maria heard...

Granted, most of what was being said, in whispers no less, was ridiculous but everyone seemed to know that Clint had, until very recently, been one of SHIELD's assets and that he had very, very recently actually beat three men to death with his bare hands.

Every time she heard someone talking about it, Maria shut them up.

They didn't know what had actually happened. They hadn't been there. It was classified.

If that didn't work, she wrote them up.

Maria ended up writing up a lot of people those first couple of weeks and wasn't surprised to learn that she also scared the shit out of everyone.

She was okay with that.

"We've got a problem."

Maria had just unlocked her office door and hadn't even turned on the lights when he'd spoken to her. From inside the room. Sitting at her desk.

"How the hell did you get in here?" Maria asked Clint, walking over and pushing him from her chair.

"That's a different problem," Clint said, shaking his head and stifling a yawn. "One at a time."

"Fine. What have you got?"

"Branson," Clint said, opening a file on his notebook and flipping it around for her to see. "On three. Last night he got a very large, anonymous, deposit to a savings account he opened three days ago in Miami."

"So?" she shrugged. "Pick him up for questioning."

"I want you to do it."

"You want... why?" she asked. "Wait, I don't care why. No. No," she said, shaking her head. "You can't tell me what to do. I have rank and this... this very clearly falls on you."

"No, it doesn't and it's really not that simple."

"Yes, it is."

"No, Maria," he snapped, and she didn't bother to correct him for using her first name. "It doesn't. I don't have anything solid yet. I can't drag someone in without proof."

"Then get proof."

"That's what I'm trying to do and I need your help. If I start sniffing around, looking into this guy, he'll know what's happening and bolt before we can find out who's paying the bills. If you start sniffing around, everyone will think he forgot to fill out the right form for flushing the toilet, and he may even come to you and try and straighten it out himself."

"And then what?" she asked. "I interrogate him? What, are we going to play good cop, bad cop with the guy? I soften him up and then you come in for the kill?"

"No," he said, shaking his head. "That wouldn't work. I don't think you know how to soften anyone up."

"Thanks."

"What I'm talking about is more like bad cop," he said, indicating her, "insane cop," he finished, motioning to himself.

"That's not much of a stretch for you."

"It isn't," he said, finally cracking the briefest of smiles. "But I think it might work. You set him up, catch him off guard and then I'll come in and finish the thing."

"What if it doesn't work?"

"I tell Phil."

"You haven't told him yet?" Maria asked, clearly surprised. That wasn't procedure.

"I just found out."

"Still..."

"Still what?" he asked, growing prickly again. "Fury put me in charge. And Coulson trusts my judgment."

"I think Director Fury technically put Agent Coulson in charge."

"Never mind," Clint said, getting to his feet and shaking his head. "I should have known better but... forget it, Agent Hill. I'll do this on my own."

"I didn't say no," Maria said quickly, regretting what she'd said. She hadn't thought about it, but he'd probably taken it as an insult. She hadn't meant it that way. Not really.

"You don't have to," he fired back at her, slamming the door on his way out.

Maria stared at the spot he'd just occupied for a few minutes before finally just sighing and getting to work.

If she'd have known it was going to go as badly as it ended up going, Maria would have chased after him, but she didn't. And by the end of the day, three people were dead, and Maria, Clint, and Agent Coulson were all stuck standing in front of Director Fury, trying to explain.

Clint did most of the talking, and even though he looked strained, he never sounded stressed.

He'd pulled Branson aside and confronted him about the money transfer. At first, Branson had denied everything, but after some back and forth, he'd finally confessed. It had all happened in one of conference rooms and it had all been caught on tape.

That's when Branson told Clint that he hadn't been acting alone.

Leaving him with security personnel, the next thing Clint did was inform Coulson. Together the two of them began tracking down Branson's accomplices. Unfortunately, by that point, the gossip mill had already begun spinning. Everyone seemed to know that Clint was 'talking' with Branson, which could only mean one thing, and which also gave the other three all the warning they'd needed.

Agent Coulson had ended up in a firefight with two of the guys down one corridor, while Clint ended up in a knife fight with the remaining guy down another. Each had taken hostages, refused to negotiate, and had left neither Coulson or Clint much choice.

Satisfied with their accounts, Director Fury left it at that.

Unsatisfied, but keeping quiet until after Director Fury left, Agent Coulson turned on Clint as soon as the door had shut.

"You should have told me sooner."

"I had it," Clint said, shaking his head.

"No, you didn't," Coulson said, shaking his head back at him in disagreement but never even raising his voice. "You got lucky. We got lucky. You should have came to me, first thing. As soon as you suspected anything, Barton, you should have came to me." Coulson paused, letting it sink in for Clint, which didn't take long. Clint nodded slightly and Coulson sighed. "Granted, you had the right idea but you should have never confronted this guy on your own. Your name shouldn't have been involved. It sends a message. Everyone here knows what you do and what you're here to do."

"I guess..." Clint started to say, dropping his head rubbing the back of his neck with a free hand as Maria unconsciously flinched, waiting for her name to come up. "...I guess I just didn't think of it like that. It was my job. I thought I should be the one to handle it."

"That's commendable," Coulson said, "but next time, ask for help."

Clint nodded again and Agent Coulson seemed somewhat mollified.

Maria was not.

"Go get some rest," Coulson said, obviously not liking the look on Clint's face or the sag of his frame. "We'll do an official after report tomorrow."

"Yes, sir," Clint returned quietly, and without even a glance Maria's way, left.

Maria stood there for a moment, unsure of what to do next, watching as Agent Coulson pulled together his materials in order to leave.

"Something I can do for you, Agent Hill?" he asked without looking up.

"Yes," she said, surprising even herself. "What Agent Barton told you..."

"Yes?" he said, his attention fully engaged.

"He wanted to do it your way. He... he approached me first and asked if I would call in Branson so that it would be less suspicious."

"And what happened?"

"I said no."

"I see," Coulson said calmly. "Any particular reason why you said no?"

"Because..."

"Let me guess," he supplied for her. "You thought it was his responsibility? Or you thought it was beneath you?"

"Yes," she admitted.

"And what exactly do you think I should do with this information?"

"I don't know," she said briskly. "Tell Director Fury."

"I could," he agreed, "but I know Clint, and he'd deny it. For whatever reason, he seems to trust you."

"And you don't?"

"I trust him," Coulson answered flatly.

"But doesn't exactly carry over though, does it?"

"Agent Hill, I think it's best for both of us if we continue this conversation at another time. It's late and I've had a long day. Tomorrow is going to be a longer one. I don't want to be rude and, if we keep at it, we might find ourselves saying things we shouldn't."

Maria nodded tightly and Agent Coulson gave her a thin smile in return before leaving the room.

Initially, she went back to her own room. There were plenty of things she could be doing other than thinking about everything that had gone on during the day but instead...

She knocked on his door.

On her fourth attempt, he answered, still pulling a t-shirt down as he opened up. He looked exhausted and wet and not very happy to see her.

"Sorry," she said, assuming he'd been in the shower.

"What do you want?"

"Can we talk?" she asked. Clint leaned against the door, blocking her entrance as he rolled his eyes, waiting for her to continue. "In private?"

"Not tonight, Sweetie. I've got a headache."

"Dear God, Barton. Stop with the pet names."

"You love it."

"No," she said, shaking her head firmly. "I don't. Now, are you going to let me in or what?"

Clint hesitated for a second before taking a step back and swinging the door open further, allowing her entrance.

Maria had never been inside his room before and it was almost exactly like she imagined it would be. Nothing cozy or sentimental. Nothing out of place, or even existing in its place without some kind of necessity. As far as personal items, he seemed to posses exactly two; bows, both functional, that were hung up on the farthest wall. The only sign that someone actually lived in the space was the bed, which looked as if it had never been made, and a small stack of books on the end table that all looked dog-eared and well-read.

"Okay, we're alone," Clint said, still standing and crossing his arms over his chest. "Talk."

"I wanted to say thank you. You could have told Director Fury and Agent Coulson what happened -"

"I owed you one," Clint said, interrupting her quickly.

"For the report?"

"Yeah," he said with a short nod.

"So, what? Are we even?"

"Yeah," he returned again, quickly. Maria nodded in acceptance and felt almost disappointed. "Done?"

"I guess so," she said, but before she could turn to go, she spotted something more. "Wait. Are you bleeding?" she asked, pointing at the stain on his shirt, she realized now, he'd been trying to cover.

"It's a scratch. Doesn't concern you."

Maria let out a huff of air and refocused on his bed. The covers were a mess, but they were also doubled over on the end. Taking a few quick steps across the room, she reached down and ripped back the blanket to find a first aid kit and several bloody bandages.

"Were you sewing yourself up?" she asked, shocked. They had a medical unit with plenty of personnel. This was completely unnecessary.

"I was about to," he said with a heavy sigh. "Thought the bandage would hold but turns out it was a little deeper than that."

"Let me see," she said, hands on her hips and deadly serious.

Clint looked like he was going to object, but decided against it. Instead he mumbled some obscenities under his breath as he slowly wrenched his shirt up and over his head. Maria understood now why it had taken him so long to answer, the movement looked painful. The cut itself was ugly and still weeping blood. It ran along his right side and was deepest in the middle, looking very much like a deflected blow.

"How'd this even happen?" she asked as she got her supplies ready. It wouldn't take many stitches, just a few to keep it together in the middle, which was something else she was curious about. "And how were you going to do this yourself?"

"I'm a leftie," he said, holding up his left hand for emphasis.

"Are you also a contortionist?"

"Maybe," he answered with a snicker, and while she normally didn't appreciate his suggestive comments, Maria was relieved to hear him joking again.

"Seriously," she pressed, motioning over so she could clean the wound before she began, "shouldn't your Kevlar have deflected this?"

"It would have... if I'd had it on."

Maria fixed her eyes on the gash, determined not to look up at him. And angry. She was so angry in that moment, because it was a stupid mistake. It was beyond stupid, it was careless and he could have been killed.

"What?" he asked after a few minutes of silence. "No lecture? No threatening to tell Fury or Coulson on me?"

"No," she said quietly, having finished the last stitch and already setting about applying a fresh bandage.

"I thought I'd at least to get to hear some more about proper procedure."

"Not today," she said tightly, done, and back on her feet facing him.

"Okay," he said. "Thanks for the help. Looks like I owe you one more."

"No," she said, shaking her head tightly. "Don't. Don't bother."

"That's not how it works."

"I don't care how it works," she snapped back at him. "You want to do something for me? Even us out? Wear your goddamn vest."

"It itches," he said, quickly continuing on as soon as her eyes narrowed on him. "And it's not strictly required, only recommended."

"Not required? Really? Is that why you stood there and bled through a counseling? You are unbelievable. You've been on my ass about safety and security since the moment we met and then you don't even wear basic protection. Unbelievable."

"Listen, I can't move in the damn thing. It's too heavy. It's restrictive and it doesn't flex, like, at all. And I need to be able to move. Period. If I can't, I'm dead anyway."

"Then commission a new one," she said with a sigh. He should have done it a long time ago.

"I tried and..."

"And what?" she asked, her anger suddenly flaring up again.

"They said no."

"Who said no? Development? Acquisitions? They can't tell you no. You're the fucking security lead," she yelled, livid on his behalf. "If you need something, they get it. End of discussion."

"Maybe they do that for you but... Shit, they know I don't know what needs which form and who has to approve it. It took me a week to requisition a chair for my desk."

"You approve it," Maria said, exasperated by the situation.

"I... I didn't know that."

"And they didn't tell you," she finished, letting out a huff of air.

"Why would they? I know I've made everyone here jumpy."

Maria understood what he meant. She understood it very well. It was a silent rebellion. They didn't like him and this was payback. Years of dealing with the same kinds of situations had left Maria almost immune to that particular tactic. She knew how to plow over everyone in her path if the need arose. Apparently, Clint did not.

"That's your job," she said after calming down a bit. "And they should do theirs."

"And I make them do this how?"

"Don't worry about it. I'll take care of it tomorrow."

Clint looked like he was about to object, but Maria stared him down until he finally shrugged.

"Okay," he said. "Okay, I guess this is where I thank you. Again."

"Please," she sighed, as she crossed the room to leave. "Can we stop thanking each other? It's becoming exhausting. I help you; you help me. We both work for the same people. We're both doing our jobs. Let's not turn this into a contest, okay?"

"That almost sounds as if you like me," Clint said, walking over and leaning next to her beside the door.

"I can think of worse people to work with."

"You can?"

"None quite as infuriating as you, but..." Maria trailed off as their eyes met. He had that look again, but this time she was prepared.

"But what?" he asked quietly.

"Barton," she said, hoping to come off as stern, but knowing she fell short. "What are you doing?"

"I was thinking about kissing you."

"Why?" she asked, and she hated that it came out like an embarrassed chuckle. She hated it more because he was smiling after she'd said it.

"Do I need a reason?"

"Yes."

"All right," he said, taking another half step closer, "how about because you're beautiful."

"That's not a reason," she said. "That's not even..."

"It's true," he finished for her. "And most people would could consider it plenty of reason."

"I'm not most people."

"No, you are not," he said with a grin. "Okay, you didn't like that one so... how about because, as I recall, you're pretty good at it. Isn't that enough of a reason to want to do it again?"

"Those were... The circumstances were completely..." she said, struggling to find the right way of saying no. And failing. Maybe because part of her didn't want to say no. "Why are we talking about this?" she asked, finally finding her voice and hoping to dismiss the whole thing as a joke. "People don't talk about this... This is... this is not something..."

"You're right," he agreed before stepping forward and kissing her, ending their debate.

Maria hesitated for a second before wrapping her arms around his torso, careful to avoid his wound, but still eager to pull him closer. Clint responded immediately, turning and pressing her, gently, into the wall. Tugging her as close as he could, running his hands up over her shoulders and neck, before they came to rest in her hair.

He broke off first, stopping long enough to look her in the eyes, before planting a series of smaller kisses on her lips and then moving down to her neck.

Maria let out a moan and wasn't surprised to feel Clint smiling against her skin. A moment later he traced his way back up her neck, near her ear, pausing again and meeting her eyes. And she realized what he was doing. He was giving her an out. He was making sure she wanted this, that she wanted to be there with him.

It was just enough time for her to clear her head.

Clint stopped.

He pressed his forehead to hers, still slightly out of breath, and dropped his hands back down to her shoulders.

"Maybe you should leave," he whispered. "Got a busy day tomorrow. I'm sure your schedule is full of people to terrorize and punish. I wouldn't want..."

"Shut up, Barton," she said with a faint laugh, before pulling him back and pressing her lips to his.

This time, he didn't hesitate, and she didn't leave.


	12. Chapter 12

_**xii.**_

They slipped easily back into their old routine. They went to the gym together, ran together, Agent Coulson opting to join them every so often, and they went to target practice on the range together. Clint still wouldn't let her try his bow. Maria knew that was never going to change, but she occasionally still asked, mostly to annoy him.

What had changed was that in addition to Director Fury's meetings, which were still required three times a week but now took place on the Helicarrier, Clint and Maria began their own bi-weekly meetings to ensure operations and security worked together more efficiently. These almost always included Agent Coulson, who seemed happy with their progress, and who not only covered for Clint when he couldn't be everywhere, but for Maria when she was absent.

Nothing about their attitudes changed in the slightest. In fact, Maria had half expected rumors to begin cropping up again, now that she and Clint were obviously spending more time together, but they hadn't. They still fought, loudly, about practically everything important and unimportant. They still had no issue calling the other one on it when they stepped out of line. There was no preferential treatment and the general feeling among everyone at the station was that Clint was an asshole, and Maria was a bitch, and that they both hated each other intensely, in sort of the same way everyone hated them.

Maria was okay with that.

In fact the only thing that had really changed between the two of them was that, whenever possible, whenever they had time alone, they had sex.

Maria had never been a very affectionate person and she'd discovered that while Clint kind of was, he could keep it under wraps until they were alone. The physical act aside, he seemed to enjoy just holding her and sometimes didn't even press for more than that. Sometimes it seemed like he was only with her because he was lonely and needed another person beside him at night. Maria understood that, even if she wouldn't admit it, because she'd been lonely too. And even if his touch, his caress was loving, she knew there wasn't love behind it.

Clint also was more strict in referring to her as Agent Hill or Hill around everyone else, but when they were together he always called her Maria. That part was harder for her than for him. Maria had managed to drop the Agent, but now, everywhere, he was Barton. He seemed to understand that she didn't compartmentalize as well as he did. She could only treat people one way, and sometimes even when they were alone, she had a hard time letting go.

"You got plans tonight?" Clint asked, poking his head through the doorway. He never knocked.

"Who would I have plans with?" Maria asked, still tapping on her keyboard as she tried to finish her thought.

"Good point," he said, throwing her a wink. "Want to get out?" Maria stopped and looked at Clint, trying to judge exactly what he meant by that, because this was dangerous ground. Friday nights out had become an occasional thing between them mostly because it was expected from them by others. The problem with him asking now was that it was not Friday night and Maria hated deviating from the norm. "Phil needs a drink," he explained. "That's kind of an occasion. Me, you, Phil... I think Sitwell and, man, what's her name? Works in research... not the shrew, the other one."

"Lisa Garcia."

"Yes," Clint smiled. "Garcia. That's her."

"Exactly why hasn't HR come down on your ass?"

Clint stepped completely into the office and shut the door and Maria smiled, even though she really shouldn't encourage him.

"You want to discipline me later?" he asked with an obscene smile as he sat down across from her.

"There is so much wrong with you."

"But you're not complaining."

Maria didn't answer, but she did give him a smile as she shut down her workstation and got to her feet.

"Where are we going?" she asked.

The where turned out to be a tiny dive bar not very far from their station. Agents Coulson, Sitwell, and Garcia were all there, as Clint had said they would be. Also there, Agent Romanoff. It turned out she had a week's reprieve from her current, long-lasting assignment, and was in town. Either Clint hadn't known about it or he'd failed to tell Maria. Out of those two options, the latter was the most likely.

For the bar they were a large group, but they'd still managed to secure a table that accommodated their party. Romanoff moved quickly and snagged the seat between Clint and Coulson. Afraid of being obvious, Maria hesitated for a split second before sitting in the free seat to Coulson's left. Garcia, clearly conflicted, chose the lesser of the two evils, and sat down beside Maria, leaving Sitwell the last chair, between her and Clint.

"How about a toast," Coulson said, and to Maria he sounded a little bit sad as he held up his glass.

"What are we drinking to?" Romanoff asked, raising her glass without pause.

"To... to what might have been."

Maria drank along with the rest of them but she was still confused.

"Sorry, Phil," Clint said, shaking his head.

"It's official then?" Romanoff asked, almost at the same time.

"Word came down today," he answered with a sigh and a shrug. "But, what can you do? We tried."

"What's this about?" Maria asked, no longer able to contain her curiosity.

"The Avengers Initiative," Sitwell answered. "It's been officially shut down."

"It's been dead in the water now for months," Coulson amended. "But I kept hoping... Oh, well. Things haven't turned out so badly," he said, turning to Romanoff and Clint as he did so.

"You know I didn't care either way," Romanoff said dryly, but Clint kept quiet. He just smiled tightly at Coulson, and Maria understood that he'd been just as invested as the other man in whatever this project had been.

They spent a few hours at the bar, all of them, talking comfortably. Romanoff might have been a little too comfortable for Maria's liking, but she tried to squash that particular feeling and hoped it didn't show. Still, every time the other woman leaned in and whispered something in Clint's ear, which was a lot, Maria felt herself tense up as she remembered all the rumors she'd heard about the two of them. Of course, Maria had never believed half of what anyone said, but it was hard to deny that the two of them didn't have a connection.

After they'd gotten back to station, Maria had every intention of going to her own room and going straight to sleep.

Clint did not.

She took some persuading, in truth very little persuading, but they'd ended up in his room. After they'd finished, they lapsed into an easy silence with Clint having wrapped his arms around her as Maria rested her head on his chest.

"What was that project?" she asked. "I'd never heard of it before tonight."

"Doesn't matter, does it? Not anymore."

"I'm just curious," Maria said, and when Clint didn't say anything more, she pressed on. "You were both involved? You and Coulson?"

"And Tasha," he added. "Sitwell was probably going to come on board once it got operational. But it didn't so..."

"Doing what?"

"You know, I have no idea what Sitwell does," Clint answered with a laugh.

"I meant what would you be doing," she said, leaning up and facing him. "I recall a rather stern lecture about assets and positions in SHIELD."

"If you want to talk about positions," Clint tried, smirking at her as he pushed a stray strand of hair from her face.

"Be serious," she intoned.

"Okay, okay," he sighed. "This... this was completely new. This wasn't a typical assignment or transfer. Most of it was Phil's idea. Fury had a lot of input, but Phil... I thought it was genius. Natasha thought it was nuts. The basic idea was that we would have a team made-up of SHIELD agents and other outside, interested parties with particular talents. Phil was going to act as the main liaison, the middle man, between us and SHIELD. That way the team had more leeway to do what needed to be done, separate from SHIELD, but SHIELD could still use them to combat threats."

"And you were going to be on this team?"

"You don't think I could?"

"I'm not sure I understand the necessity."

"Well, someone agreed with you because it isn't happening," Clint finished.

"What would this Avengers Initiative be used for?" Maria asked. "What would they do that you couldn't... that SHIELD's assets couldn't do before?"

"We would have handled larger threats. Assets take out one or two people, tops. Sometimes there are more but... I guess the idea was a little farfetched, but it was a great one."

"I still don't get it."

"What's to get?" he asked, and she could hear that he was starting to become annoyed. Maria didn't care though. It didn't sit right with her.

"It just sounds a lot like..."

"Like?"

"It sounds a lot like Fury was building his own private army."

"Wow, you're paranoid," he said lightly. "I mean, don't get me wrong, I like it, but... Come on, Maria. How would that even happen?"

"By gathering a group of loyal people around him who happen to have special skill sets."

"Okay, I'll give you that that was what this sounds like, but that's not what it was."

"You're sure?"

"I was part of it," Clint answered firmly. "Yes, I'm sure."

"Barton, you know they don't tell us everything," Maria sighed, dropping her head back onto his chest. "Not even this project we're supposed to be some of the few read on to. This Tesseract... there's more to it and..."

"And it's best not to think about it," he said, running his hand back through her hair. "You'll drive yourself crazy if you do. Trust me."

"I do," she said softly.

"This Avengers thing," he said after a few minutes, having gathered his thoughts, "it was supposed to be something good. That's why Phil's so disappointed. We were going to do good for a change. It was a chance to be something more than just trained killers."

Maria held her tongue. She understood what he'd meant, but she thought Clint might be purposefully blinding himself to the reality of the situation. That he might have been so eager to escape his last position that he really hadn't given this new one too much thought. Maria couldn't help but feel a little relieved that the project hadn't come to fruition.

Yes, there was the potential for good in the idea, but within the details there was room for something much different.


	13. Chapter 13

_**xiii.**_

They hadn't seen one another in over three weeks and Maria couldn't tell by Clint's expression what exactly that meant for them.

Not that she thought of them as a them...

Clint was standing near the back of the room whereas Maria was at the front, by Director Fury's side where she always stood. She'd been overseas on assignment for the Director and it was her first evening back. They hadn't spoken yet, hadn't communicated at all during her absence, and now Maria was starting to wonder if Clint had lost interest. That maybe in the time that had passed he'd grown disinterested or simply moved on to someone else. He certainly had that kind of reputation.

Maria wasn't bothered by the idea, except that he should have just told her. They weren't in a real relationship and she hadn't fooled herself into thinking that they were. If Clint didn't want to be with her anymore, that was fine, but if that was the case, he should have just said the word. He should have let her know so she wouldn't stand there, like a fool, wondering why he wouldn't look her way. Because he absolutely would not and had not looked at her, not even once. Maria knew because she'd spent the majority of the time looking at him.

Mercifully, the briefing ended and Director Fury released them all for the night.

Maria immediately set about securing all of the briefing materials and noticed that Clint was still there, in the back of the room talking to one of the agents she recognized but didn't know personally. She thought he was someone Clint was trying to get on the security detail, which Maria considered to be a point in the other man's favor. Maria could count the number of people Clint talked about as being competent at their jobs on her hands; she'd only need one hand to count the number of people he actually liked.

Finished, she looked around and realized the room was empty. He'd snuck out while she'd had her back turned. Maria hadn't taken him for a coward but people were always disappointing her that way.

And she had to admit, even if it was only to herself, that she was disappointed.

Maria turned off the lights before leaving the room, locking the door and double checking the way she always did, before turning with a frustrated sigh down the hall and towards her quarters.

Half a second before she felt his hand gently touch her lower back, Maria had realized he was following her. Clint had fallen quietly, and naturally, in step by her side, still avoiding her eyes as he hastened their pace. Maria half turned her head but caught the subtle shake of his own which kept her looking, and moving, forward. He steered her down the passage, the palm of his hand still softly resting just above her waistline, before stopping outside her room.

He took a step back and allowed her to unlock the door and step inside while checking down the hall for any unwanted attention. Confident that they were alone, and that no one had watched them leaving the conference room together or entering her room together, Clint followed her inside. Maria smiled as she turned to face him, relieved to see him smiling back and moving towards her, kicking the door shut with his heel.

She really shouldn't have doubted him, but doubt was in her nature.

Without a word he wrapped his arms around her waist, pulled her against his body and finished with a kiss.

Maria responded by sliding her hands up over his shoulders, letting them come to rest at the top of his neck, her body moving against his. Their kisses were slow and deliberate, not without need or desire, but leisurely. Now that they were alone they had the whole night, and they knew it; there was no need to hurry.

Clint pulled away from her just enough to look her directly in the eyes.

"I've missed you," he said. Embarrassed, Maria tried to fight down a blush, momentarily too confused to speak. "I really have," he continued, his fingers slowly grazing up and down her sides.

"I'm not sure it was just me you missed," she tried, hoping to turn the conversation from the serious, because Clint sounded deadly serious, and make it playful.

"Not going to lie," he laughed, wrapping his arms back around her again tightly, "I didn't hear a damn word Fury said. All I could think about was you and this and I really considered whether or not we should take our chances there and even try to make it here."

"I'm surprised you showed such restraint."

"It was a close call," he said, leaning in and talking low in her ear. "But I know how you feel about protocol. I wasn't sure of the procedure or if we'd need forms signed in advance."

"Since when have you been so worried about protocol?"

"What can I say," he sighed, "you're rubbing off on me."

"Am I now."

"Well, you could be if I could figure out..." Clint laughed, leaning back and giving her a once over. "These damn things. If I meet the asshole that made these uniforms... I think they were specially designed to keep us from fraternizing," he finished, having given up trying. He'd been fumbling with her uniform for the past few minutes with no luck.

"And yours is better?" she laughed.

"Not really," he admitted as she reached over and knocked on his chest lightly the way she'd tap on a door; pleased to hear the tell-tale sound that meant he'd been wearing his new, much lighter and easier to move in, Kevlar vest.

"Tell you what," she said, pausing long enough to pull him in for another quick kiss. "Let me go in there," she said, indicating the bathroom, "get into something less restrictive while you get comfortable in here."

"I can do that," he said, kissing her again and reluctantly letting her go.

Maria felt his eyes on her the entire trip across the room.

Alone, she took a deep breath and realized she couldn't stop smiling. This thing between them wasn't serious, but that didn't mean it wasn't something. Maria didn't know what that something was, but it was there. It was fun. It was thrilling. He made her feel special and sexy and needed and for now that was plenty.

Maria was more than just okay with it, she was happy.

She was also happy she'd found a way to get out of her uniform without Clint watching, because no matter how hard a person tried, no one looked good trying to get out of a jumpsuit. The top half was easy, and maybe even a little fun to watch, but it stopped being sensual once she had to unlace her boots and pull her feet and legs free.

That done, Maria undid her hair and ran her fingers through it a few times, not wanting it to look like she was trying too hard. Confident that she looked good, she took another steadying breath and waited half a minute more before rejoining Clint in the other room.

She found Clint, stripped down to his underwear and t-shirt, sitting in the semi-dark and reading the paperback she'd left, in reality for him, on the nightstand. As soon as he heard the door click shut he looked up and smiled, tossing the book aside and leaning forward appreciatively. Maria stood there, momentarily awkward, in her bra and underwear, which she'd suddenly realized did not match.

Not that he noticed.

"You look amazing," he said quietly.

"We don't..." she started, stopping herself from saying 'match', not because she didn't think he looked the same, but because of her damn underwear again.

Clint raised an eyebrow at her and then laughed, catching her meaning after a pause.

"Am I not showing enough skin for you?" he asked.

"Shut up, Barton," she returned, finally moving forward and into his waiting arms, yanking his shirt off herself as she straddled his waist.

Clint slid his hands into her hair, something he loved to do, as he began to kiss her neck, occasionally grazing his teeth gently across her skin in the process. Maria rubbed her own hands up his chest, over his shoulders and down his back, just enjoying the touch of his skin beneath her own; running across an occasional jagged spot she knew had a story, most of which she'd managed to hear.

Except for one.

"Are you ever going to tell me how this happened?" she asked, her right hand rubbing a smooth circle over the spot high up on his back, nearly dead center. Three small, circular scars that formed an almost perfect triangle.

"Let's talk about your body," he said, the tips of his fingers slipping impatiently under the elastic on her hips. Clint leaned in for another kiss, this one slightly reckless and needier than the last. Everything about him having become urgent. His hands pushing down slightly on the fabric of her underwear, before he pulled her closer still.

Maria let out an involuntary moan and momentarily forgot what she'd asked as he slid his tongue into her mouth and deepened their kiss. With one steady movement, Clint wrapped one arm around her waist, using the other as leverage to lift and turn her back towards the bed. Laying her there gently as he hovered over her.

"I knew I should have did the bra first," he said with a wicked small and she laughed with him.

"Don't think I'm so easily distracted," she said, after he fumbled on the garment in question and finally succeeded.

"Distracted from what?" he asked, all innocence as he trailed kisses down her breastbone to her bellybutton.

"I'd..." she began, not wanting to admit that he had distracted her a little bit.

"You... what?" he asked, continuing to plant light kisses on her stomach, his fingers tugging playfully at her underwear again.

"I'd asked you a question."

"Do you really have to know right now?"

"No," Maria answered, and Clint smiled until she went on with, "and we don't have to have sex right now either. Your choice."

"Fine," Clint sighed, crawling up beside her and laying at her side. He propped up his head on one hand and used the other to tug her closer, rubbing circles on her side and back. "But I'm giving you the abridged version. The full version takes all night. And there are other things I want to be doing all night tonight and none of them involve talking. Well... they don't involve a lot of talking."

"So tell me already."

"I was shot."

"That's... that's it?"

"Yes," he said with a nod.

"Shot with what?" she asked, dragging her hand over the spot again and frowning at him. Maria couldn't think of a single weapon that left a triangular shaped scar.

"With a bow."

The confusion must have shown through her features because Clint sighed and dropped his head back against the pillow, having been forced into the longer version after all.

"It's three shots," he explained as he met her eyes again. "Three arrows."

"At once?"

"More or less."

Maria continued to frown, her hand still resting against his back, her palm flat against the mark which she realized were more or less where his heart was. Someone had tried to kill Clint. Someone had very nearly killed him.

"When did it happen?"

"Oh, it was... years ago," he said, hoping to dismiss the topic. "Before I was in SHIELD."

"After the circus?" she joked, because that was their joke.

"Just after," he smiled, pushing her hair back over her ear and letting his hand linger against her neck. "Like I said, a long time ago."

"And did you know who it was? Did you find them? Were they caught? What happened? How did this happen?"

"Maria," he sighed, dropping his head again.

"I'm not trying to pry."

"I don't mind you prying," he admitted. "I just... This isn't something I like talking about. It's been handled. Okay?"

"Handled how?"

"Permanently," he answered.

"You..." she started to say, but stopped as soon as she saw him shake his head. "You didn't?"

"I wanted to," Clint said evenly. As he did so, he dropped his hand from her entirely and Maria, missing the contact, responded by moving closer to him. "I tracked him for months. Planned exactly what I would do. What I'd say. Did I mention I was kind of young and stupid?" he asked, and Maria thought he looked the tiniest bit relieved to see her laugh. "I was. I thought it was going to be like a movie or something. I was all ready for revenge and then... then someone beat me to it. I wasn't the only one he'd pissed off."

"Who got there first?"

"SHIELD did. They'd sent an asset in to take him out, but, you know, at the time I didn't know that. I just saw some other guy move in on my target. I went ballistic. I was so angry. And stupid. I mentioned that, right?"

"You may have."

"Wasn't even twenty. I was underfed with an oversized ego. Confronted the guy and got my ass kicked," Clint said, almost fondly. "I still think he shot me in the knee to shut me up."

Maria screwed up her eyes at him. "I thought you said Coulson did that," she said, pointing to the scar she knew he was talking about.

"He did," Clint answered with a grin. As it sunk in, all she could do was shake her head disbelievingly.

"Agent Coulson was not an asset," she said firmly.

"If you say so."

"He was not," Maria repeated, slapping him playfully on the chest. "You are making this up to get out of telling me the truth. Admit it."

"I am not making this up," Clint laughed, pulling her closer again and running a hand down her back.

"There's no way. I mean... Barton, look at him. Agent Coulson probably wears a tie to bed."

"You think about what Phil wears to bed?"

"Shut up, you know what I'm saying," Maria laughed. "He doesn't look like the type. Granted, I didn't think you looked like the type either."

"I don't look deadly?"

"Not really."

"But I don't look bad, right?"

"You look..." she said, losing a few minutes more to kissing. "Wait," she said, pulling away again before it got too serious. "I just need this cleared up first because... Coulson? An asset? I have to know more."

"It's not like he hides it."

"Then why don't more people know?" she asked.

"Because after I came on he became my handler. That was over ten years ago. That's a long time. People forget. They find something new to talk about. You know that."

Maria nodded and realized it fit. She hadn't thought about it but Coulson had stayed a handler a lot longer than normal. It wasn't as if he wasn't smart or capable, he just hadn't advanced. The same way Clint had said assets never advanced.

"Are we done talking about Phil?" Clint asked, running his hand across her stomach before planting a kiss on her shoulder. "I hate to be that guy, but I've got a meeting at four tomorrow morning and we have a lot of lost time to make up."

"I'm so sorry," Maria playfully mocked. "I didn't know you needed your sleep so badly."

"Oh, I have needs but they aren't for sleep," he said with a grin as he leaned in and kissed her hard on the lips.


	14. Chapter 14

_**xiv.**_

Their time together had become more and more limited.

Maria was busier than before, learning all the ins and outs of her job as Director Fury's right hand, and subsequently passed more of the operational side of the Tesseract project off to Agent Coulson. At the same time, Clint's own job ratcheted up a notch when it became obvious that hostile forces around the world knew what SHIELD was up to and had begun to actively try and infiltrate the organization. So, in addition to monitoring all of the employees working on the project, Clint now had the added task of monitoring everyone who showed too keen an interest outside of SHIELD.

At most, they saw one another three days out of the week, with the majority of that time being spent in meetings or surrounded by co-workers and subordinates. Once a week Maria tried to spend the night in her old room, always accompanied by Clint, and if that didn't happen, Clint would make an excuse to get onboard the Helicarrier for some increasing valuable alone time.

Both of them were extremely taxed.

Being together had become less about combating loneliness or some sort of crazy, unexplainable attraction, and more about just being together. Maria enjoyed his company. He made her laugh. She understood him better and she liked him. Maria liked him a lot. She wouldn't go further than that, she would only say that when he wasn't around, she missed him. That much was very true and it felt like enough to keep their situation going.

"You realize you never told me what your type was?" he asked, rather abruptly one morning as they both lay in her bed, wrapped in one another's arms, waiting on the alarm to signal that their time was up.

"You don't think you're it?" she asked, and in the semi-darkness of her room Maria could just make out his smile.

"You told me I wasn't. So, tell me all about him. Who is this mystery guy I need to keep a watch for?"

"There's no one guy."

"Oh, so there are multiple men?"

"Shut up, Barton," Maria laughed as she squeezed him closer. "That's not it. I just meant... no, you're not who I'd normally attach myself to. That's all I meant by that."

"Are you going to tell me who would be because... I think you have a future in torture. You really know how to drag a thing out."

"Typically," Maria started, embarrassed without any real reason and thankful that he couldn't see her blush in the dark, "the guys I've..." she stopped short, aware she'd about to use the word 'dated' when that was clearly not what she was doing with Clint.

"The guys you've..." he repeated, egging her on.

"Been with," she finished, "they've all been, I don't know... I guess if I had to say what my type is, it would be more academic and less physical. Tall. Handsome, with dark hair and dark eyes."

Maria waited and it felt like a very long wait. She couldn't hear him even breathing in the silence. His face was still visible, barely, but it was set like stone.

"I think you just called me short, ugly and stupid," he finally said, and Maria was relieved to hear the jest in his voice. "Wow. Why am I here again?" he asked, jokingly pulling away.

"I did not," she said, tugging him back into her arms. "That's not... I wasn't comparing you against that..."

"You kind of were."

"I didn't mean you weren't those things," Maria argued.

"You said I wasn't your type," Clint said with a laugh. "Therefore, I'm not those things."

"You are purposefully making this difficult."

"Maybe a little," he admitted before leaning in and stealing a quick kiss.

"All right then," Maria said, unable to keep from grinning at him. "What's your type?"

"My type?" he asked back at her, clearly set on avoiding the rest of this conversation.

"Yes, you're type. That is the question I am asking you. Right now. Tell me."

"Well," he said, propping his head up on hand as he eased onto his side to face her better and resting his other hand on her hip. "I've always had a thing for women who can kick my ass."

"I've heard."

"That's probably not very healthy, but I can't seem to help myself."

"And these women... What do they look like? Do they have any particular...attributes?"

Clint shook his head at her and pressed his lips together tightly.

"I told you mine," she pressed.

"You can just come out and ask."

"Ask what? I did ask," she repeated, not willing to admit she knew exactly what he was getting at. Maria really hadn't thought she'd been so obvious. "You just haven't told me."

"I'll tell you anything you want to hear."

"I'm sure you will," she countered.

"Last chance," Clint said. "Anything you want to know. Right now. Ask me."

Maria hesitated. On one hand, it wasn't her business. They weren't really anything other than two people who happened to have sex. But on the other hand...

"I'm going to regret this," she sighed, and he laughed. "Okay, but... just tell me. What's with you and Romanoff? What is that all about? Were the two of you ever..."

"Ever what?"

"You know what I'm asking."

"Okay, okay," he said, finally serious. "You want to know what's between the two of us and truthfully... I couldn't say."

"Oh."

"She's... she's probably the person that knows me best," he explained, rolling onto his back and looking up at the ceiling as he did so. "I can't tell you what it is because I've never had anyone like her in my life before."

Maria shifted uncomfortably, not sure how to handle what he was saying. Not sure how it made her feel, except that her stomach was absolutely in a knot. His words sounded like a confession, but he hadn't actually confessed to anything.

"So... are you still..." she said, because Maria felt she had to know. That, at this point, she might even have the right to know.

"Still what?" he asked, his eyes darting back to meet hers.

"Sleeping with her," Maria said crisply.

"No."

"You can tell me the truth. You said you would."

"I am," Clint insisted, with just enough emphasis so that he didn't sound harsh. "And we've never slept together. Tasha and I have never been about sex. People just assume that and... and I go along because it keeps guys from bothering her."

"Because she can't take care of herself?" Maria asked, not buying it.

"She can," Clint said with a chuckle. "No, she really can, but... if she did, she'd be breaking arms all over the place. All the time. It's more that she doesn't want to deal with the attention. I know you don't know her very well, and I think when you do, you'll like her, but Tasha... she's not very... I don't even know how to explain it. I mean, her whole job is about being sexual so..." he trailed off, having obviously reconsidered what he'd been about to reveal. "I won't say there wasn't a time when we could have been something. But it never happened. It passed and we're both happier because of it. That's it."

Maria said nothing, just thought about what he'd said for a few minutes.

"You don't believe me," he said quietly, as if to himself.

"It's... it's kind of hard to believe."

"Why?" Clint asked, and after another long silence, because Maria couldn't think of an answer to give him, Clint went on. "No, forget it. Don't answer that. I know why."

"I didn't say that I don't believe you," Maria began tentatively.

"Just that I'm hard to believe."

"No," she said quickly, before letting out a huff of air in frustration.

"You didn't just say that?"

"I did but... Will you just look at it from my point of view? There's the two of you, who whenever you're together all you do is... is flirt, there's no other way to say that. You sit and talk and whisper and... and I'm supposed to think nothing ever happened. Ever. That's not an easy thing to buy."

"Fine," he said, sitting up and swinging his legs off the bed as he spoke. "Have it your way."

"This isn't me having it how I want it," she said, sitting up and, despite the hour and the very real possibility that they could be overheard, she was just too irate to care. "I'm just saying -"

"I know what you're saying," he barked as he pulled back on his underwear, his back still to her.

Maria sat there and watched as he got dressed, taking several steadying breaths and not wanting this to escalate any further.

"If you say it's over," she said, shaking her head and trying to be calm, "I believe you."

"I'm saying there was never anything to end," he replied curtly.

"Okay," she said softly. Clint had sat back down on the end of the bed to put on his boots, and having finished, continued to sit there with his back to her. She wasn't sure he'd heard her. Nothing about his body language changed. Maria watched and waited for what felt like an eternity until she couldn't take it any longer. "You don't have to go."

"It's better if I do."

"If that's what you want," she said, her tone as icy and indifferent as she could make it. He was willfully misunderstanding her and refusing to accept her apology. Maria didn't need this, not now, not ever, and certainly not from Clint.

"This isn't what I want," he fired back at her as he walked quickly to the door. "This isn't what I want at all," he repeated, losing momentum as he spoke, "but when do I ever get that?"

Maria didn't stop him from leaving but found she couldn't just go back to sleep either. And the longer she sat there and thought it through the more angry and unhappy she became. It would have been fine if she was just feeling that way about Clint, but she was also angry and unhappy with herself.

She hadn't been fair and she knew it.

Maria finally dragged herself out of bed and into the shower, determined to do something productive with her time and not continue to waste it wallowing. After she got dressed she went straight to her office and started reviewing the various reports Coulson had forwarded to her since she'd been on the Helicarrier. It was time consuming, and necessary work, but after she'd read the same sentence three times she realized that she wasn't in the right state of mind for it.

To kill time, and maybe for other reasons, Maria pulled up the now defunct Avengers Initiative files and began to scan through them. It was a unique assortment of people, that was certain, and even if she'd told herself it was only curiosity, the first file she actually opened was Clint's.

Three lines in and she had to close it down. It felt too much like invading his privacy. True, Clint had admitted to reading hers, but Maria knew he'd only been talking about her general file, the one that was accessible to just about every SHIELD agent with a high enough clearance. They weren't very informative, the general files, but they did give you a sense of what a particular agents skills were so that if you were looking for a certain talent you could locate the right person easier.

Assets didn't have general files.

Neither did former assets.

Everything Maria knew about Clint she'd found out one of two ways: she'd heard it from another agent or he'd told her himself. And while she didn't put much stock into the stories that had been told to her, he wasn't exactly a reliable narrator either.

For example, Clint had told her he had no family, which was easy to believe since he never spoke about having a family. Backing that up, he'd casually joked about being an orphan to Coulson many times, who, from what Maria knew, would have objected had it not been true. Maria believed him. No problem.

What wasn't as easy to buy was that Clint also claimed he'd lived with the circus. He never said what circus or for how long or even how he was more or less adopted into the lifestyle, but he had talked about it regularly, and it had to be a lie. Maria had always thought it was a lie, that maybe he just didn't want to talk about his foster home, which was understandable, and exactly why she didn't inquire further. What she couldn't understand was how detailed and good he was at embellishing his circus stories. All she could assume was that he had a very vivid imagination. Actually, Maria knew he had a very vivid imagination.

Despite that, the overall picture he provided for her of himself through their conversations and arguments and discussions had felt accurate and believable but...

Maybe she tried so hard to keep her own personal life private that she was projecting. Maria didn't let people in and she was distrustful of those that tried to get in. It was possible he was being completely truthful with her, about all of it, and she was just so jaded she couldn't tell anymore. Maria had just never trusted anyone enough to believe.

But the circus stories had to be bullshit.

At just past five in the morning and Maria pulled back up the initial reports she'd tried to review when she heard a key in the doorknob and a split second later Clint was pushing his way through.

"You have a key?" she asked, staring at him suspiciously. "That's how you've been getting in here?"

"Disappointed?"

"Kind of," she admitted. "I thought you'd crawled in here through the air ducts."

"Too confining. I only do that when I'm desperate," he said, tentatively taking a seat but not before sliding the key across the desk towards her. "I found that in my office our first week here."

"Thanks," she said, picking it up and turning it over a few times in her hand before placing it in the top drawer.

"So," he said, taking a deep breath and casting about the room for something, other than her, to look at, "I got kind of upset earlier. Not your fault. That was... that was me. And I am sorry. I know what it looks like and why it would be hard to understand. Tasha and I have been together for so long..." Clint stopped and shook his head abruptly. "Shit, I don't want it to sound like that but I can't make it sound any other way. And I know you don't want to hear it."

"I do, actually," she said softly. "I do."

"We've never been physical. Honestly. It's never happened, or it never happened because we wanted it to. There have been missions where we've had parts to play but it never went very far. It was always an act. That's not saying that I didn't..." Clint trailed off again, looking confused.

"I don't need to know everything," Maria said quickly, not wanting to hear any more. "That's really between the two of you. It doesn't concern me," she added, more forcefully and maybe to prove to herself that it was true. When Clint didn't react, Maria continued, "I just want you to be truthful. I know we're not serious here. I'm not trying to wring an emotion out of you. Neither of us want that. We're having fun and that's fine. That's what it is."

"Okay, if that's what this is then why are we bothering with all this talk?" he asked, and to Maria he sounded just a little bit bitter, although she couldn't figure out why.

"Because I want to know if I'm being used," she snapped.

"Used how?" he asked. "If we're both here because we want to be how am I possibly using you."

"It's one thing for the two of us to decide that we like being together and it's another thing for you to be with me to try and prove something or get back at her."

"I'm not," he said ardently.

"You say that but... I'm just not willing to put myself in a position to be the other woman. I don't want to be the catalyst to something bigger."

"You're not," he said, clearly angry now. "Damn it, Maria, I thought that... Forget this. You don't believe me or understand anything. Obviously, you just don't."

"It's not that."

"It is," he emphasized. "And... you know, ask her. Ask her how she feels about me. I'm clearly not getting across to you what I thought I was. Clearly," he repeated as he locked eyes with her. "So, if you don't believe me, ask her. Ask Natasha."

"And say what?" she shot back at him. "Hey, Romanoff. Barton and I are having sex and I wanted to make sure he's not secretly in love with you? What do you think?"

"Sounds like you've got a plan."

"Uh, no," she said shaking her head. "I'm not... I don't even know her and..."

"You don't believe me. You won't ask her," he said with a sigh, shaking his head and clearly exhausted. "Maria, is this is an excuse... if you want out just say it. Just tell me you're done and that's that. We don't have to jump through these hoops. It doesn't have to be this hard."

"That's not..." she returned, suddenly unable to even look at him, because maybe it was what she wanted. Maria thought that part of her wanted out before it became too serious. And it was already too serious, whether she admitted to it or not. It was already very serious if she was becoming jealous and protective and...

"We can both walk away from this right now," he said, sounding indifferent. "No hard feelings. No grudge. I know you can't take me at my word, but -"

"Is that what you want?" she asked, quick to take hold of his words.

Clint just shrugged his shoulders and Maria thought it was as much of an answer as he was ever going to give her.

"Fine," she said, dropping her eyes back to the screen and endeavoring to keep her voice calm. "We can just end this and move on."

"Perfect," he replied, slapping his hands on his knees before getting to his feet and making for the door. "See you around, Hill."

Maria dipped her head in response, her eyes still down, waiting for him to leave. Clint stood there for a second or two before finally walking out. After the door was shut she finally felt as if she could breathe again. She was relieved it was over. She was glad to be done with the fighting. Mostly though, she knew it was going too far. They were never going to be anything more than what they already were, so it was better like this. It was much better to just stop it now before it really got out of hand.

Maria could breathe again, but she couldn't figure out why she also wanted to cry.

* * *

**Notes: **Obviously, I hate happiness.


	15. Chapter 15

_**xv.**_

If she'd expected, like in times past, for Clint to disappear or keep a low profile for a few weeks following their blowout, Maria was mistaken.

He was everywhere.

Clint was much more actively involved in the operational aspect of the Tesseract project, thanks in part to their previous collaboration and also to Agent Coulson's continuing influence. He was also delegating more of the actual security of the station to various agents who had worked hard to prove themselves to him. Because of that, he had more free time to be onboard the Helicarrier to help plan field operations. Maria was glad to see him embracing his job in different ways, and knew how much it meant to Clint, but the timing was awful.

It was hard to be around him. It was extremely hard, but it could have been worse.

Clint kept his word. He wasn't rude to her. He wasn't distant. He interacted with her very much in the same exact way he always did, and in the same way he did with everyone else, which was honestly difficult to accept. It was what she had wanted, she'd thought, until she had it. Maria hadn't realized how much a part of her life he'd become until then.

He no longer stopped by her office at odd hours, just to talk. He never let himself be alone with her. She'd begun to notice little things like the fact that he never seemed to laugh, or if he did, she was no longer around to hear it. When they argued, which they still did over work related problems, it felt personal to her, when it really wasn't; maybe because there was so much indifference in his tone.

Clint didn't look at her unless he had to.

Maria tried to be okay with it.

Three, four, sometimes five or six times a day she told herself that it was for the best. That this is how it had to be and that, given time, everything would be back to normal. She'd forget in time. They were a disaster in the making and never, in a thousand years, going to happen on any significant level.

Neither of them had wanted that in the first place.

This wasn't supposed to be a relationship, and Maria didn't want a relationship. It was a ridiculous notion at this point in her life. She had just got her career going. She had no free time. She was under a lot of stress. Adding another person to the equation in any way was close to impossible. There was just no room for that now. It could wait. It would have to wait. The timing was awful. They'd be awful.

Hadn't they been?

Maria ignored the voice way back in her head that said she was lying. The one that asked, 'Isn't that what they'd had? Wasn't that still a possibility?'

Her answer was no.

It had to be no.

"You know what needs to be done," Fury said, ending their late night meeting on the Helicarrier.

Maria, caught off guard, waited a moment before gathering up her things. She had only partially paid attention. Between the drama she'd never wanted with Clint, and the extreme amount of work they'd been expected to do, and the stress they were all under, it was a lot. She was tired and worn thin. If she got more than four hours of sleep that night, she'd be thrilled.

She pulled herself together just in time to realize the room was empty except for Maria and Clint.

"When do you want to do this?"

Maria's eyebrows shot up in surprise at his question and unintentionally her cheeks flushed pink. She had no idea what he was talking about. Or, if she did have an idea, why he suddenly thought that it was even an option any more.

Seeing her confusion, Clint tried to hide his smile by dropping his head and saying, to the floor, "The briefing. Director Fury wants us to work together on that high-level brief. Did you hear anything said tonight?" Clint asked, meeting her eyes again and Maria felt her breath catch in her throat.

"Of course I did."

"Okay."

Clint continued to stare at her, refusing to give any more information, and letting Maria stew silently until she couldn't take it any longer. It was his way of teasing her, his old way. And she'd missed it, Maria had really missed it, but she couldn't let it go on.

"What briefing?" she asked curtly, doing away with all the potential back and forth between them.

"Nothing big," he assured her. "I took notes. We got a few days until he needs it."

Maria nodded, "Thanks."

"I've got some time free tomorrow afternoon if you're available," he said, sounding more businesslike. "After that I'm back on station so even if we just get this started, have something to begin with, we can email it back and forth to hammer out the details. Shouldn't take long."

"Yeah," Maria said, shuffling her belongings and moving towards him and the door. "Okay. We can do that. That's... that's easy."

"Good," Clint said, his eyes darting around the room in a sudden and determined effort not to meet hers any longer. "I'll stop by your office tomorrow."

"That's fine," Maria said, wanting to leave but not wanting to pass by his side. Afraid he'd hear that she was slightly breathless, if he hadn't already. Realizing that she'd been avoiding these situations as much as he had.

It was the most time they'd spent alone since that morning, and the room, large as it was, felt claustrophobically small. She was certain he could hear her heartbeat; that he could hear her thoughts. The distance between them felt lessened somehow and all she had to do was close the gap and admit it. Say what she'd been thinking and feeling and wanting and...

It felt like the beginning again, the start of something electric and inviting and just out of reach.

It also felt stupid and humiliating and redundant, because they couldn't do this again. Maria couldn't let it happen. She couldn't admit that she still wanted it to happen, not even a little bit. Because she could miss his touch, his laugh, his smile. She could miss the feel of having him close, the way he smelled, how he said her name in the dark and how he held her tight.

And she did miss him.

There were dozens upon dozens of beautiful things about Clint that when added up, they added up to make this person she'd never expected to know...

Maria could step forward and say those thing, admit them to him and to herself, but she still had a hard time believing it.

When it mattered, how it mattered, she had a hard time trusting it, and him, and herself, because she was so conditioned for disappointment, Maria had begun courting it. She was always ready and waiting for the eventual let down. She was prepared for it. Things she could see and touch which were factual and unvarying were comforting to her, and had always been; emotion was not. Attachment was not. They were unknowns and abstracts and nothing that was ultimately real.

Maria knew people could say whatever they liked, but it didn't make it real.

She knew that trick very well.

"Maria?" Clint asked, quietly concerned, after he'd peeked out into the hallway and ensured they were alone.

"I'm fine," Maria returned, shaking her head sharply. "I'm just... Long day," she said, forcing a smile and trying to look convincing. "It's been a very long day and I really should go."

She missed him.

"I won't keep you," he said, knowing it was a dismissal, and she watched as he walked away without a single attempt to stop him.

Again.


	16. Chapter 16

_**xvi.**_

Less than a month ago he'd been in her bed.

When Maria finally had a moment to think, a pause in the night that had started off with panic, moved on to chaos, and ended in disaster, it was all she could think about.

He had once shared her bed and he had just tried to kill her.

There really was no time for this, and Maria knew it. She needed to move. She needed to act and to organize a rescue operation and start accessing the losses.

Add ticks to his column.

And just like that, she was thinking about him again. About how she could still remember the feel of his breath against her neck. Or the way he'd always managed to touch her hand when times were tough and the days ran long, back when they'd still been something.

Did they ever mean something?

It was too much to believe. Every thinking part of her screamed out that it had happened, it was real, she had seen it, witnessed it, but she couldn't reconcile those facts with what she knew of him. Maria relied on facts and evidence; she believed in them. And she had seen it but still, she couldn't put this man she'd witnessed together with the Clint she knew. The pieces didn't fit, but they didn't have to. They were already there and in place and the picture was complete.

Maria didn't know how to feel.

Fortunately, there was so much to do and emotion took a backseat. It was the only relief she had. For the next several hours she was constantly busy and constantly in motion. The damage was catastrophic. The station might never be fully functional again and was likely a total loss. The death toll was fortunately not as high as it could have been, thanks largely to Agent Coulson. Coulson had begun evacuation orders well ahead of Director Fury and Maria's arrival.

'Clint had helped with that,' a voice in the back of her head reminded.

He had liked to whisper her name in the darkness, too. He would hum in the shower because he said he didn't know the words. When he'd look at her, she had felt special and it was one of the things she'd missed most. No matter what his expression had been, when he'd look at her, his eyes were always warm.

Except this time.

She couldn't do this. Not now. Maybe not ever. Maria had a job. She had responsibilities. There would be time to fall apart later.

And she was fairly certain that this was what the start of a nervous breakdown was like.

Still, she couldn't help but think about the fact that Clint had sent away all the unnecessary lab personnel and ensured those that remained would have a safe transport out should it go bad. She'd been on the line with him earlier in the evening confirming his plans. He'd sounded exactly the way he always did; there simply had been no trace of what was to come. Why would he do that if he was going to do this?

Why had any of this happened?

It was something to her that he'd at least not caused the event. At least, she didn't think he had. The speculation around the recovery camp was that he'd simply taken advantage of the situation. Maria didn't have all the details and realized they might never have all the details. Maybe Clint had done it all alone. Maybe he'd had help. Maybe this was his out; his plan all along.

Her head was too full of maybes.

Maybe she'd been part of his plan.

She wouldn't allow herself to think about it any longer. Not when there was so much to do. She had to push it aside and push through. Same as she always had. Same as he'd expect her to do.

It was nearly sunrise when Maria finally allowed herself a break. Since then she'd been called, several more times, by Director Fury, and once by Agent Coulson who let her know he'd arrived with the transport at the predetermined evacuation location. She had just sat down with a cup of coffee, too numb to think and thankful for it, when a new agent, a young man she didn't know by name approached her looking nervous.

"Agent Hill?" he began hesitantly.

"What?"

"There's... there's a VTC set up for you."

Maria lifted her eyes from the rim of her cup as it hovered just before her lips. She didn't need this. She didn't want this. It was someone else's turn for a minute because she had to have caffeine or else she'd never make it. She was past exhaustion, Maria was empty. She needed to be empty of thoughts and emotion. Right now she couldn't afford to start thinking again.

Sensing some of that, the man twisted his hands together behind his back and rocked up on his heels.

"It's urgent."

"If it was urgent," Maria said coolly, "Director Fury has my number and would call me directly."

"It's not the Director, Agent Hill."

That got her attention.

Standing up, Maria motioned the man on and fell in a few paces back, tossing her still full cup in the trash bin along the way. The junior agent stopped outside of the command tent and held the flap back, ushering her in first. He pointed Maria to the monitor and tapped in a few lines on a console before quickly retreating from the area.

Maria stood, stock still, staring up at the monitor and waiting.

"Agent Hill," a man said almost as soon as his face appeared. Well, it sort of appeared. He was alone on screen, but she knew he wasn't the only person listening. In the dim light of whatever distant end the man was on, he could be almost anyone. She imagined that was the point. "I understand there was quite a commotion last night."

"Yes, sir," Maria answered. She recognized the voice but did not know the name of the man to whom it belonged. She had sat in on exactly one World Security Council meeting with Director Fury. It had been enough.

"And the clean up?"

"Still underway," she answered, mentally breathing a sigh of relief. They only wanted an update, which given she was the senior ranking agent on sight, made sense that they would want one from her. "We were able to evacuate the majority of personnel with minimal causalities. I've compiled a list of those known to be missing and those -"

"That's all well and fine," the man said, interrupting her and waving a hand dismissively at the screen. "File your report when it's complete. What I want to know, Agent Hill, is how this happened?"

"Pardon me," Maria returned, a little irked that the deaths of even one agent would be so callously brushed aside, let alone the dozens that had occurred. Still she had to admit that he might have a point, and that there were bigger concerns at the moment. They'd all get to grieve later. "I assumed Director Fury had already filled you in, sir. He was present at the time."

"And so were you."

"Yes, sir," she answered with a nod. "But not in the lab."

"Then outside of the lab," he pressed. "Report."

"Where would you like me to begin?" she asked.

"You can start, Agent, with when this man left the lab with the Tesseract," he answered, pulling up a picture on her monitor of the man she'd seen with Clint. She still didn't know his name or who he was or anything really. Maria felt like she should be getting a briefing, not giving one.

"He exited the lab with an armed escort."

"Who escorted him?"

"Agent Barton," she responded without hesitation.

"Was it only Agent Barton?"

"No, sir," Maria said, her chest pulling tighter the longer she spoke. "Dr. Selvig was there as well, along with another agent or maybe two... It happened very fast."

"What did?"

"Bar..." she began, but caught herself, "Agent Barton led the group out of the lab and requested two vehicles."

"And you gave them to him?" the man asked, and Maria heard it. There was accusation in his tone. "You didn't think that was odd?"

"He's the security lead for the project and we were in crisis. I assumed he was beginning the final stage of the evacuation."

"I see."

"I then asked him who he was escorting and Agent Barton responded that he had not been told," Maria added, strangely feeling the need to justify her actions, even though she'd done nothing wrong.

Everything about this felt wrong but there was no option here.

"And you didn't think that was odd?" the man pressed, and this time there was no doubt about it, he was accusing her of something, Maria just didn't know what yet.

"Yes, sir," she admitted. "I did."

"Why is that?"

"Because Agent Barton knew everyone at the station. It was his job to know everyone at the station."

"And was he good at his job?"

Maria hesitated. This was surreal. Her whole body ached.

"Very good, sir."

"I see," the man repeated before pausing and seemingly listening to someone else off screen. "What happened next?" he asked. "Did you confront Agent Barton?"

"No, sir."

"Why not?"

"I had no reason to," Maria answered after the briefest of pauses. She didn't want to talk about this or think about it. It was too soon. She didn't want to remember the look on his face. "I thought it was odd that Agent Barton didn't know the man, but that wasn't cause to accost him."

"So you just let him go?"

"No, sir," Maria responded. "At that time Director Fury contacted me directly and informed me of what was happening."

"What did he say?"

"I..." she stammered, really stumbling for the first time since the start of this meeting. Maria could still hear his voice. She could still see Clint's reaction. It was just too soon to be talking about this at all.

"Agent?"

"He said that Agent Barton had turned," Maria answered, and the tightness around her chest squeezed hard until she felt nearly breathless, but she wouldn't let it show. She couldn't let them see how badly she was affected.

"And then what happened?"

"As he heard the transmission, Agent Barton drew his gun and fired on me," she answered, and it still didn't feel real. She'd seen it. She'd witnessed it, but Maria thought that deep down, she'd never believe it had actually happened. It all felt like a bad dream. Maria would almost swear that, any moment now, she'd wake up and this would be a bad memory. "I took cover and returned fire and then gave chase. The tunnel collapsed and I was unable to catch him."

Less than a month ago he'd been in her bed.

"Thank you, Agent Hill," the man said with a firm nod and she knew, she just knew, that he hadn't needed her to confirm any of this. He already knew. He just wanted her to say it.

"Is there anything else?" she asked, her words clipped as she tried to maintain some semblance of professionalism.

"We'll be in touch," he answered before signing off and leaving her to stare at a blank screen.

Maria finally realized what it was she'd been feeling since the moment this situation had begun.

She felt sick.


	17. Chapter 17

**Notes: **I tried very had to stay as close to the movie events as I could. This chapter is something that is really a squeeze to fit in, is never even hinted at having happened in the film or the deleted scenes, but hey! that's why we write fanfiction, isn't it?

* * *

_**xvii.**_

The mood on the Helicarrier was intense. Everyone was quieter and working harder than Maria had ever recalled seeing. There was a lot to do and very little time to do it in. That and the addition, however brief it might be, of Agent Romanoff had set everyone on their toes.

No one would say it, but the general feeling was that if Clint turned, Romanoff would be next. That they might even be working together. It wasn't common knowledge why Clint had turned; that the man, she guessed he was still a man despite what they'd been briefed, they'd named Loki had done something to him. Director Fury had called it brainwashing, but even he'd said that wasn't exactly it, only close. Regardless, the majority of the personnel onboard did not know that and had only been given orders to engage Clint with caution and, if they had to, to shoot to kill.

Fury had been disappointed in her and what she'd done. He hadn't come out and said as much, not directly, not yet, but she knew what he was getting at by the way he spoke to her. Maria didn't regret it, she'd told the truth, however she wished she'd have known then what she did now. It wouldn't have changed the events, but it would have made them more understandable. She might still have told the council member exactly the same story, but Maria certainly would have driven the point home that it hadn't been Clint's fault.

She still didn't know how to feel about it.

Agent Romanoff did.

Throughout Director Fury's brief rundown of their plan, Romanoff had glared across the table at Maria. At one point, it got so bad, even Agent Coulson had begun to shift under the weight of her stare, and she wasn't even staring at him. Finally, having given them each their orders, Fury left the room, leaving the three of them engaged in a silent battle of the wills.

Maria balked first.

Unable to take it, she stood up and made for the door.

"Are you happy now?" Romanoff asked quietly just as Maria's hand had reached the handle.

"Natasha," Coulson said, his voice just a bit louder than hers had been, but still stern.

"I'm just curious," she replied in a light, almost flirtatious tone. Maria turned her head to catch a quick look at the other woman and met eyes so cold they almost burned.

"This isn't what I wanted," Maria returned, dropping her gaze to the floor.

"No one did," Coulson agreed, but Maria felt like he was only trying to defuse the situation. She knew that he was angry and upset, he was just much better at masking it. "We all have a lot to do. Natasha, your flight to Calcutta is taking off soon. You'll need to go over protocol with your security detail. Agent Hill," he continued, "if you would ensure that accommodations for our guests are prepared, then I'm sure you might want to take a break. You've been up now for nearly two days. We'll need you alert. There will still be plenty to do."

"She's done enough," Romanoff pushed, getting to her feet and refusing to back off.

"I did my job," Maria fought back, wheeling around to fully face her and taking a step away from the door and back towards the other woman.

"Oh, yes. I'm sure you did," Romanoff returned, and that same accusatory tone Maria had heard in the council man's voice was there in hers.

"They asked and I answered," Maria said, fighting down the urge to yell. "I told them what I knew. I told them the truth about everything I knew at the time."

"Everything?" Romanoff asked, eyebrow raised as she stood there, arms crossed over her chest and waiting for a response.

Maria shifted her stance as the realization hit her hard, like a blow to the stomach. Romanoff knew. She knew about the situation between Maria and Clint. For how long or how she found out about it, Maria couldn't say, but if the look she was giving her was any indication, Romanoff had known for long enough.

"This is not the place for this discussion," Coulson said, and as Maria looked at him, watched the man drop his eyes to his shoes, and saw plainly that he also was in the secret.

"It is," Romanoff countered. "She likes the truth so much except when it doesn't do anything for her. Why else would you not tell them that the two of you were involved?"

"Because we aren't."

"Liar."

"That is not a lie," Maria snapped.

"So what do you call it then?" Romanoff asked, a hint of menace in her voice. "What nice little term did you makeup to justify -"

"I don't have to justify my actions to you."

"When it comes to Clint, yes, you do."

"It's my life," Maria returned angrily. "Mine."

"You think that's how it works?" Romanoff asked, still calm despite the rising tension. "You think it's that easy? I'd feel sorry for you, if only you weren't so stupid."

"Agents," Phil said loudly, catching their attention. "This is not productive. We all want Clint back and safe but the only way we are going to accomplish that is by doing our jobs. If Director Fury is right, and Clint has any kind of self left, we have to assume he is fighting for control. But we also have to assume he's dangerous. We know he can be. And smart. We're not going to be able to track him. Assembling this team is our only real hope."

Romanoff gave him a stiff nod and moved towards the exit, but stopped just in front of Maria and looked her square in the eyes.

"I'm only saying this because Clint would want me to say it," Romanoff said quietly, "so, watch your back. They contacted you for a reason. They want something. Everyone does." Maria didn't quite understand what she meant, but dipped her head in response just the same. Romanoff's eyes darted over to Coulson and continued, "I'll be in touch after we've picked up the doctor."

"Good luck," he returned and Romanoff even smiled briefly at him before she left.

Once they were alone, Maria shifted uncomfortably, but mainly from exhaustion.

"She's right," he said. "They probably already know about you and Clint."

"There is no -"

"Then they know there used to be," Coulson corrected, sounding only slightly exasperated and weary. "They'll be watching you more closely to see how you react. To make sure you're not helping him."

"Yeah," she sighed, sitting back down in the nearest chair, "because step one is always to rat out your accomplice."

"You'd be surprised," Coulson said with a faint laugh before he also headed for the exit. "Get some rest, Agent Hill."

Maria nodded, but then something that had been bothering her popped back to the forefront of her mind.

"Agent Coulson," she called out just as he'd stepped through the door.

"Yes?"

"Why does Director Fury think Barton has any control?" she asked, because she couldn't put it together herself. None of this made any sense to her, not on any rational level. "He shot him. He still managed to help that nut escape. Isn't that just..."

"Wishful thinking," Coulson provided, stepping back into the room and letting the door slide shut behind him.

"I want to think Barton can stop himself too but..."

"He wears a vest," Coulson said and Maria raised an inquiring eyebrow at him. "Clint knows Fury wears a vest because he always wears a vest. It's like the Director said, if he'd wanted him dead Clint would have taken a headshot. But it wasn't only that that convinced the Director that he might be able to control some of his actions. Not all, mind you, but some."

"What else then?" she asked and he looked momentarily surprised by her question. Like it was something she should already know.

"Agent Hill," he said after a lengthy pause to consider exactly what to say, "you've been on the range with Clint before, correct?" He waited and Maria nodded. "So you know what he does. He's the best marksman SHIELD has, the best they've ever had and he simply does not miss."

"Yes, but if he's been brainwashed, or whatever," Maria replied, "couldn't he have... I don't know, forgotten about the vest? He still hit Fury with one shot."

"He did."

"So what's your point?" she pressed, almost too tired to think.

"It's not about Fury."

"I don't get it then," she said, shaking her head and dropping it into her hands in exhaustion.

"Maria," Coulson said, and she couldn't recall him ever using her first name before. She couldn't remember him ever sounding almost sad when he spoke. But there it was. She lifted her head and met his eyes as he finished. "It's about you."

"Me? How is this suddenly about me?"

"He shot Director Fury because he had to. He blazed a trail off station and did a lot of damage in the process. Clint is clearly not himself right now but... but he didn't hit you. Not even once. And, forgive me for saying it, but I think you might have been an easier target than Director Fury."

When Maria had no response, because there was nothing she could say to that, Phil squeezed her shoulder once and then left for his own mission.

She'd been so consumed with the thought of Clint trying to kill her, that Maria hadn't quite gotten around to realizing that he hadn't.


	18. Chapter 18

_**xviii.**_

The downtime was brutal, so Maria spent very little of her hours alone. It allowed her too much time to think and worry. It also allowed her too much hope. She'd rather be working anyway. Work kept her busy and kept her focused.

Maria really needed that distraction.

Her thoughts were like torture.

They'd detained Loki, but Clint was nowhere to be found. He'd been in Germany, but they'd missed him. They'd found his work; the bodies. They had been so close, but he'd slipped away again to no one knew where or for what purpose.

SHIELD had, in the mean time, amassed a truly spectacular group of eccentric personalities but not a one of them fit with another. Or worked together. Or seemed to be doing anything now that they had their prisoner. It was frustrating in the extreme and felt like the lost cause it was. Maria had read their files. Stark was all ego. Rodgers was out of step. Banner, while actually being useful, was a disaster waiting to happen. And, somehow along the way, they picked up another Asgardian, because one wasn't enough? It was baffling.

The only one doing anything was Romanoff.

In what even Maria had to admit was a brilliant move, she had discovered that Clint had told Loki everything and discovered part of his plan. Maria didn't know how she could even stand to be in the same room with him; she couldn't even watch on the monitor. And the things said... Maria had listened and they'd been brutal. Maria was certain she'd have never been able to do that and keep calm. Maria couldn't help but admire the other woman's determination to get things done.

Unfortunately, even that little piece of information she'd gained about Clint, and the larger information she'd learned about Loki's master plan, had not helped enough. It was never going to help because to Maria's endless frustration no one was doing anything. Or no one was doing anything they were supposed to be doing; leave it to Stark to use this situation to attempt to break in to SHIELD's databases. They were never going to work together long enough to find Clint.

Or the Tesseract.

Maria knew they were looking for the Tesseract and not Clint but...

Shaking her head as she watched these 'Avengers' bickering like school children on the monitor via the direct feed from the lab, Maria looked up and saw Phil watching as well.

He looked disappointed.

Maria understood that feeling very well.

She felt like screaming at them, but all she could do was watch.

They were supposedly the only hope. Fury believed it. Phil believed it. Hell, Clint would have believed it had he been there, which left Maria and Romanoff as the only doubters amongst them. Strange, but she felt like she'd never been in better company.

And it wasn't as if Maria didn't want to believe. More than anything, she wanted this to work. She truly did. Like it or not, they were the only chance... but they were blowing it.

"Give it some - " Phil started to say to her but was stopped suddenly as the entire ship rocked.

The engine had exploded.

Maria reacted on instinct and so did Phil, slipping off and getting to work. She began issuing orders and directing personnel until finally Fury appeared back on the bridge and relieved her of command.

It was like the station implosion all over again, except this time they knew. This wasn't an accident. This wasn't someone taking advantage of an anomaly. This time there was no doubt Clint was behind it as Maria had even caught sight of him on the security feed up on deck.

He wasn't alone.

Before Maria had time to even wonder where he'd found himself a squad to lead, a not too distant roar told her that there was bigger problems to be taken care of.

It looked as if Loki's plan was working after all.

Without waiting for direction, Maria began tracking them all. She had the Hulk to contend with and monitor, which looked more like Romanoff and Thor's problem. There was also Stark and Rodgers to watch as they attempted to right the ship, all while still trying to keep a bead on Clint.

That last one proved the most difficult.

The problem with tracking Clint was that he knew the Helicarrier almost as well as he had his own station, and probably better than Maria or anyone else onboard did. They could easily lose him in the maintenance passages and duct work. There was no telling where he was headed or what his objective might be. Maria hated to take the wait and see approach, but she was hesitant to do more. There were other concerns. There were bigger problems. They'd have to trust in their security, many of whom Clint trained, and do their jobs. The consensus was that he was there for Loki.

As it turned out, the consensus was wrong; Clint was headed for them.

The grenade had surprised her. Seeing Clint again had been a bigger shock. Amid the chaos of the fight, he looked completely calm. Surreally calm, as if he was sleepwalking. It took him two shots; one to distract them and the other to do the real damage. After he'd done what he'd intended to do, which was completely crash the Helicarrier and kill the internal systems, Clint was gone again. It was quick and vicious and very, very effective.

It had barely registered with her. It felt like a nightmare.

Maria snapped out of it, sort of, when she heard Fury barking orders at someone, anyone still able, to bring Clint down. That should have been her job, but she simply hadn't done it. Maria knew she should of issued that command, but hadn't because of shock? Trauma? She wasn't sure, but Fury didn't stop to lecture her over it. There was no time for anything short of action.

Romanoff responded.

Maria's insides froze.

She didn't think Romanoff would actually kill Clint, the way they'd all been instructed to do, but he'd proved that if he was engaged he would fight back. And Romanoff would have to engage him in some form or another. She had no choice really.

After that it was all a blur. Every second, every word, every action...

The first thing she really heard in the aftermath, the first thing that garnered any reaction at all from her was the news about Agent Coulson.

It was with a pang that she realized that as much as she had actually liked and respected Phil, Maria had never been good at expressing herself and he might never have realized that he had been esteemed by her. He was a good man and he shouldn't have been a casualty to this.

The second thing that Maria really heard was Romanoff stating she'd subdued Clint. He was still unconscious, but his vitals all appeared normal and everything indicated a swift recovery. Maria allowed herself a brief sigh of relief, but it was short lived. Clint, she knew, when came out of the stupor he was in, would never forgive himself for the role he played in Phil's death. He'd never get past it. Everything else he might learn to live with, but never that.

And as much as she might need to sit there and mourn and contemplate what was to happen next, she couldn't. Maria still had a job to do. They all did. However, after listening in on Director Fury's talk with Captain Rodgers and Tony Stark, Maria felt sick. She couldn't understand or condone it. It felt like an entire man's life could be used as a lie, wielded like a weapon to force others to do what they normally would not.

It felt like a serious manipulation and she had had enough of that for a lifetime.

Maria needed something real.

Without thinking it through, without knowing perhaps why exactly she was going, Maria headed toward the infirmary. She'd been told that's where Clint had been taken. She tried to tell herself it was a professional courtesy. Maybe even curiosity. She had to know he was fit for duty again and wouldn't be causing any more unintentional damage. That was part of her job after all.

And if she had other reasons, well...

When she arrived, it felt like the floor had dropped out from beneath her feet.

Maria looked in through the window. She saw him, saw them together, sitting as close as they always did and talking in half-whispers. Maria saw it all and she kept walking. It was familiar and wrenching and part of her screamed on the inside that Maria should have been the one in there at his side. Part of her wanted to just open the door and take a chance.

She couldn't do it.

Maria couldn't disturb whatever it was taking place. It hurt, but it wasn't her place to be there. Maria and Clint didn't have a relationship, she'd said so herself. She'd said it a dozen times to him, to her, to anyone and everyone who would listen, but mainly to herself. If there had been something there, it was gone now and maybe too late to recapture.

It had been a foolish inclination to go in the first place.

Doubling back around down a different hallway, she was just about out of medical entirely when she nearly ran into Captain Rodgers. He gave her a polite nod and stepped aside, allowing her to pass. Maria didn't even meet his eyes.

She took the long way back the bridge, using the time to try to stomp down her emotions. Still fuming, despite all her best efforts, and perhaps looking for a fight, she confronted Director Fury on his lies.

Fury's explanation to her didn't alleviate that early sense of disgust.

That's when the jet took off and the team, the team left onboard, had partially assembled.

Maria still didn't like it, but she at least now she understood.

Director Fury had lied and manipulated the situation because he had to do it. It was what had to be done to achieve the mission. Maria hated the idea, but knew that sometimes results were all that mattered. He fully believed that this was their only chance and Maria realized she believed that too.

For awhile it was a waiting game until the sky opened up over Stark Tower.

Then it was unreal.

If she hadn't seen it for herself...

Where they could, they watched on remote cameras and illegally tapped feeds. Where they couldn't see the fight, they listened in on it. Stark, Rodgers, Romanoff and Clint were all wired with radios and were using them to coordinate efforts and attacks.

When she heard him speak for the first time, Maria dropped her head briefly and sighed in relief.

Clint almost sounded like his old self.

At first, things looked to be touch and go. They were doing everything in their power to stem the tide of the Chitauri army, but there were so many of them. And they just kept coming. It was ruthless and it was frustrating to listen in and not be able to help, but the Helicarrier couldn't go; everything they had running was doing so just to keep them all airborne. It was still too damaged and they were still busy trying to shore up the ship to help tactically.

That was when the World Security Council ordered the nuclear strike. It was also when Director Fury told them to go to hell.

Maria was not only okay with that, it also marked the first time she had wholeheartedly agreed with the man without a single reservation or second thought.

Fuck them.

And it was a very selfish instinct driving that endorsement. Maria knew that. She simply couldn't stomach the thought of losing Clint again. Not this way. Not now and maybe not ever again. Maria had thrown away something, she still didn't know what, but something good because she hadn't been able to admit to it. She wouldn't make that mistake again. If she got another chance, if he gave her one, Maria was determined to try harder and see clearer than she had the first time around.

After Director Fury reached Stark and updated him on the situation, having just missed the jet taking off for New York, he returned to the bridge and continued to listen in on the action.

Up until this point, Clint had been relaying information practically nonstop. He'd been the Avengers eyes at the scene, but also theirs back at the Helicarrier. Maria couldn't help but notice that the more he talked the better he sounded. Clint had started off brisk and curt, but the more time that passed the more sardonic and dry his tone turned.

Then he stopped.

Without warning and for a good five minutes there was nothing but a steady silence on his line.

Maria was on the verge of checking in on, just to be certain, but before she could Fury beat her to it.

"Agent Barton," he snapped on his direct line. "Report."

For half a minute more there was nothing. In that span, Maria could hear her own heartbeat in her ears. Her whole body had tensed up, waiting for his reply or waiting for someone else to confirm the absolute worst.

"Sir," Clint finally said, and it was a surprise to hear him sound winded. "Just exited... Shit, I don't know which building this is. Sorry," he said muttered, apparently realizing he was on live. "I'm on the street -" he stopped abruptly and over the communications feed Maria heard the familiar snap of a bow " - now and making my way to Stark Tower on foot," he continued as if never stopping.

"Hurry."

"Yes, sir," Clint answered. "Just picking up ammo on the way."

Maria assumed that meant he was either low or out of arrows entirely, which made sense as long as he'd been out there. And while she'd been happy to hear his voice again, albeit briefly, she noticed he also sounded so tired. Whatever adrenaline high he'd been riding had obviously ended.

Just after Clint had signed off, they all watched in a sort of muted horror as Stark, well, Iron Man, saved the city. Or maybe she had that backwards after all.

When he'd done it, when it looked as if it was really and truly over, the place erupted in cheers. Maria couldn't find it in herself to join them, but it wasn't because she wasn't happy. She was overjoyed and overwhelmed with a variety of mixed emotions.

But mainly, Maria was thankful.

"Agent Hill," Director Fury snapped as soon as the commotion on the bridge died down.

"Sir?"

"You ready to get back on the ground?"

Maria nodded and began issuing the commands necessary for their descent in the harbor.

It was over and she was going to see him again.


	19. Chapter 19

_**xix.**_

Maria stood at Director Fury's side listening as Thor explained how he'd secured his wayward brother Loki with a specially designed muzzle, brought with him from Asgard, and how Loki had been locked the lowest level of the Tower for everyone's safety. It was going to take a few days but he seemed confident that Dr. Selvig and Dr. Banner, with Tony Stark's help, like it or not, would be able to design a device to house and power the Tesseract, enabling the demi-gods return trip home.

If anyone had been expecting an argument from Fury, they were disappointed. And while he didn't agree or approve what had been said or done, he made no effort to stop it from taking place.

"Ms. Potts's plane has been diverted to Green," Fury said, turning to Stark. "I've sent a helicopter to escort her back to New York."

"Well, wasn't that thoughtful," Stark replied, and Maria noticed that everyone present looked completely drained; even Thor, which she didn't think was possible.

Of course it wasn't just physical exhaustion. Everyone there had been emotionally taxed as well.

"I'm a thoughtful man," Fury said so dryly Maria would have sworn he was joking. "Now, where are my agents?"

"Crashed out in one of the spare rooms," Stark said, pointing vaguely over his shoulder.

Fury gave him a crisp nod before continuing, "I'm leaving Agent Hill here as my liaison."

"The more the merrier," Stark returned, and like Thor, he'd decided for himself he was done. Thor had already retreated to the couch, sitting near Dr. Banner, while Stark had resituated himself behind what remained of the bar.

"Agent Hill," Fury said, before turning to go. "Find Barton and Romanoff and bring them up to speed. Let them know that they're not to report back in officially until they're ready to resume their posts. Understood?"

"Yes, sir."

"That goes for you as well, Hill."

Maria nodded and got his message, loud and clear, and Director Fury left her to it.

"Ask them what they want to drink while you're at it," Stark called out as she moved out of the room.

She ignored him.

Picking up the away bags she'd arranged for them back on the Helicarrier, Maria treaded down the hallway, only getting lost once, before happening upon the right door and opening it up. Upon entering she found Romanoff pacing on the far side of the room in front of a different door Maria could only assume was the bathroom.

Romanoff stopped and looked her up and down once before resuming her slow walk in a steady circle.

Maria bit back her initial response and momentarily busied herself by placing the bags she had in hand on the bed. After a minute more of silence between them, she had to say something.

"Director Fury asked that I speak to you."

"So speak."

"To both of you," Maria emphasized.

"Don't worry," Romanoff said coolly as she crossed her arms, "I'll pass the message on."

Maria took another few steps towards the other woman, not willing to give in quite so quickly. As she did, she noticed something she hadn't before; the sound of running water.

"I'm supposed to tell you both in person. You and Agent Barton."

"Were you now," she returned indifferently.

"It can wait," Maria said, hoping to sound as if she didn't care but knowing by the look on Romanoff's face that she hadn't succeeded. She turned to go, stopping only once she reached the door because she had to know. If she couldn't see him, she had to hear it. "How is he?"

"How do you think he is?" Romanoff said, but Maria thought she sounded a little less harsh than she had just moments ago.

"Does he know?"

"I told him," Romanoff answered, guessing correctly what Maria meant. "Afterwards. I don't think it's sunk in yet."

Maria was still thinking of what to say in return when the bathroom door opened, startling the two women in the bedroom. Neither of them had heard the water shut off, but there was Clint, clutching a towel around his waist with one hand as he leaned against the door with other.

"Do you think Tony has anything that's not ridiculous that I could wear? I can't get back into that suit. Not right now."

Maria froze in place, just outside of his peripheral vision, and waited to see how Romanoff would respond. For a split second, it didn't look like she would respond at all, but finally she said, "No need. Agent Hill dropped off our things."

Romanoff waved her hand across the room towards Maria and Clint's eyes flew briefly to hers before they landed back on Romanoff with nothing but surprise visible on his face. Maria watched as that emotion was traded for something different, something harder to define. Clint took a steadying breath and clutched the door tighter, leaned into it just a little bit more.

"She was just leaving," Romanoff said sternly, seeing the effect Maria was having on Clint.

Maria didn't even argue with her. She saw it too and it wasn't good.

"No," Clint said sharply, before she was out the door. "Wait. Natasha, can you give us a minute alone?" When Romanoff stared at him without answering, he pressed with, "Please."

"Fine," she said, snatching up her bag as she made to go. "I'll go find myself another shower. See you in half an hour."

The last thing she did was glare at Maria, sending the very clear signal that if she messed this up, Romanoff would personally make her pay.

As soon as she left, and without really thinking about what she was doing, Maria went over to the bed and began to shift through Clint's bag in an effort to find him something to wear.

"I can get my own clothes," he said, suddenly at her side and making her inadvertently jump.

"Sorry," she said, holding out the items she'd already extracted from the bag to him. "I was just trying to help."

"I know," he said quietly, his fingers brushing hers, lingered even, as he took the clothes from her. It was definitely a moment but it was quickly over. Like something from their past. Clint took the clothes and in a shocking display of modesty, for him at least, retreated back to the bathroom in order to get dressed. Maria thought, for a moment, that she should leave, but he'd left the door open a crack and, while he was changing, called out, "So, tell me... how mad is Fury that we didn't stop this thing before New York got trashed?"

"Do you really care?" she called back, hoping her tone came off as playful.

"I wish I did," he answered as he opened the door, and to Maria, Clint looked not just worn out but worn down. "I just... I don't. It doesn't seem important after... It wasn't bad when I had something to do, something to distract me from..." Clint stopped and took another deep breath and it looked as if he was seconds away from passing out. His whole complexion had gone pasty white and he was continuously rubbing his face with his hands, as if he was trying to wake up.

"Sit," Maria intoned, rushing forward and taking him by the arm, all but pulling him with her to the bed where she forced him down without much protest.

"The shower was a very bad idea," Clint sighed, dropping back against the bed with a thump. "It was too hot. My head is pounding."

"When's the last time you slept?"

"I... I don't know," he admitted with a heavy sigh as he dug the heels of his hands into his eyes. "Sleep wasn't a priority."

"It is now."

Clint offered up a weak smile, but it quickly disappeared.

"Maria," he said, gesturing for her to join him. She was reluctant to do so, but only because her stomach felt heavy with anxiety and anticipation. Maria didn't know what to expect from him, but didn't see the harm in sitting at his side. As soon as she had, Clint snagged up her hand in his and gave it a squeeze and Maria felt some of the tension in her body leave. "I'm sorry about what happened. I'm so sorry that -"

"Stop it," she said sharply, but she didn't pull free from him. Instead, she held his hand tighter than before. "That wasn't you. That wasn't your fault."

Clint swallowed hard and gave her a brief nod, but she could see he didn't believe it.

Romanoff was right, none of this had really sunk in for him yet.

"Okay then, just tell me the truth. You like doing that," he said and she winced recalling Romanoff's words on the Helicarrier. Wondering how much else she'd already told him. "You have to tell me because Natasha won't," he continued on, not picking up on her reaction, "and I know you know. How many agents?"

"Not now."

"Yes, now," he pushed. "I need to know."

"So you can what exactly? Berate yourself more? It wasn't your fault. You don't need to know any more than that."

"What, did the two of you get together and rehearse that speech?" he asked, a little angry at the flat refusal for facts he'd received so far from everyone.

"Hardly," she said with so much emphasis he actually laughed.

But he quickly sobered, "I'm going to find out. Eventually." Maria only nodded, having guessed as much. Maria and Romanoff could only delay the inevitable and hopefully get Clint in a better state of mind in the mean time. "And Phil?" he said, and Maria's stomach turned and tightened again as Clint's voice shook with emotion. "You two didn't decide ahead of time not to tell me about him, did you? Or was that Fury? Who was it that said telling me could wait? That the mission was more important? That anything was more important?"

Maria hesitated. She and Romanoff had their problems, but even if there hadn't been an epic alien battle looming in their immediate future, Maria would have agreed to delaying the news of Agent Coulson's death. Clint still wasn't in the proper state of mind to handle it, even now, but there probably had been little choice. She imagined Clint had begun to question Phil's absence and forced Romanoff's hand.

It turned out her silence was just as damning as her words could have been.

"So it was all Tasha," Clint sighed, reading her correctly. "Should have known. I don't know how I'm going to forgive her for that one."

"Don't be... don't be too hard on her," Maria finally said, shaking her head as she spoke. "Nothing was normal and she had just lost him, too."

Clint nodded and she found herself hoping he did forgive her. Maria suspected, in her own way, Romanoff was trying to spare him for as long as possible. It was her way of being protective.

"I've got to shut my eyes," he said with a heavy sigh, crawling into the center of the bed and resting his head against the pillow. "I have got absolutely nothing left."

"I'll leave -" she said, already on her feet when he interrupted her.

"No," he said promptly, partially sitting up and urging her back to his side. "Can't you... Would you stay? You don't have to..." Maria dropped her gaze to the floor, but nodded in agreement. Briefly she met his eyes and gave him a tentative smile before laying down beside him on the bed. "Thank you," he whispered, turning on his side to face her. Catching up her hand again in his and pulling it quickly to his lips.

"You're welcome."

Clint took another deep, and somehow worrying, breath before shutting his eyes. Her hand still locked in his.

Maria watched him for several minutes more, until she was certain he was asleep, and then finally shut her own eyes in exhaustion.


	20. Chapter 20

_**xx.**_

"Well, don't we look comfy?"

Maria lifted her head up in surprise, rubbing the sleep from her eyes with the back of her hand. A quick check of the clock showed that they'd been asleep for close to two hours. Clint had more or less draped himself across her midsection, which made movement challenging, but she was still able to catch sight of Tony Stark standing in the doorway, looking as smug as ever.

Even if she was grateful that he had saved the world, Maria still thought he was an ass.

"I didn't realize SHIELD was so... progressive," he continued, his eyes darting to the other side of the bed.

Maria looked and almost smiled herself.

Romanoff had apparently come back, as she said she would, and decided that a nap sounded like a great idea. She was curled up on the other side of Clint, facing the opposite direction and sound asleep in the semi-dark room.

"What do you want?" Maria asked, her voice gravely from neglect.

"To invite you to dinner," he answered. "Not just you. All of you. Unless of course you'd rather stay here which... hey, have at it. We all almost died today. Me especially. If ever there was an excuse to let loose... well, there you go."

"Stark," Romanoff's voice said, deadly calm from her side of the bed, "take yourself and your vulgar speculations out of here now."

"This is still my place," he argued with her.

"Out."

Stark gave her a salacious wink, but left as Romanoff had demanded.

For a second, both women sat there, staring at the door, and then suddenly one another.

And then something happened that Maria had been completely unprepared.

Romanoff laughed.

She didn't just laugh, she positively shook with pent up emotion and stress. It seemed as if everything Romanoff had been holding back for days let loose for the moment in the only way she could currently process it: laughter.

Maria couldn't help but laugh along with her and admit that Clint had been right, she did like her. Sort of. Well, she'd stopped actively hating her, which had to count for something.

"Oh," Romanoff said, wiping her eyes with her fingertips as she wound down; her emotions packed down firmly and all back in place. "Don't tell him, but Stark's right. This does look bad."

"Well... it's not typical," Maria admitted, her hand falling casually against Clint's temple; his head still resting in her lap.

"We should get out there before he comes back in with a camera," Romanoff said, a hint of a smile still left on her features as she stood and stretched.

"Should we wake him?"

"No," the other woman answered, shaking her head for emphasis. "I don't think he's stopped since that first night. Let him sleep."

Maria nodded and, as gently as she could, extracted herself from Clint's grasp. Romanoff didn't say any more on the short trip back to Stark's living room which was full of people, or seemed that way. No one present would be in what Maria would call a jovial mood but it wasn't exactly somber either. Maria knew most everyone in the room by sight alone; the Avengers team of course were all there, minus Clint, and she recognized Pepper Potts from Tony Stark's file. She imagined everyone else either worked for Stark Industries or, and it wasn't an impossible thought, Stark had just randomly invited them up for a party.

Agent Romanoff had already filled a plate with an assortment of foods and placed herself on the farthest end of the sofa, nearest Dr. Banner. Captain Rodgers was talking with Pepper Potts, while Thor and Dr. Selvig were catching up and teaching Stark some kind of drinking game.

Maria was the odd man out.

Resigned to that fact, she partially followed Romanoff's example and picked up a plate of food, but instead of joining the party she found herself a nice, quiet corner chair off by herself. She'd never been an extrovert, and despite Stark's advice to 'let loose', Maria doubted very much she'd ever like gatherings of any sort that weren't business related. She wasn't a people person and never would be. Hell, Maria was hardly good with people one-on-one. This was entirely outside of her element.

After an hour more of observing her surroundings while attempting to stay alert, Clint showed up in the doorway looking only half awake and extremely disheveled. Maria watched as he took a quick scan of the room. He only locked eyes with one person, Dr. Selvig, giving the man a firm nod. He almost looked relieved to see him again.

Before he found her, Stark found him, and having thrown an arm around his shoulder, pulled him towards the bar, determined that everyone was going to have at least one drink. Dr. Banner was the only one allowed a pass, even Maria had to eventually accept. Clint also looked as if he'd initially said no, but Stark was relentless and kept insisting again and again. He really didn't have much of a choice.

That and Clint did love tequila.

He finished his drink and Maria tried not to stare, but she couldn't help but track his progress around the room. He stopped and talked briefly with everyone, taking the most time with Captain Rodgers, but almost as soon as he'd seen where Maria was, it became obvious that she was his ultimate destination.

When he arrived, he started first by dragging over a nearby chair so that they could sit side-by-side. That accomplished, Clint collapsed into it with a heavy sigh, tipping his head back and then to the side as he gave Maria a weary smile.

"You don't have to be here," she said.

"Neither do you," he returned.

"True."

Clint shut his eyes for a second and took another deep, shuddery breath that made Maria tense up.

"What's wrong?" he asked, dragging his eyes open again, having practically sensed her unease.

"You keep doing that."

"Doing what?"

"Taking these really big breaths like... like you can't breathe. Should I get medical to come by or -"

"No," Clint said quickly, and a little too loudly as the three nearest people momentarily turned their heads. "I'm good. No problems it's just... it's in my head. That's all."

"What is?"

"The feeling that I'm going to fall asleep and forget to breathe," he answered, and when Maria continued to stare at him, not getting it, he elaborated. "It's stupid. It really is. I just got so used to being always told what to do... there were times I felt like I couldn't breathe if it wasn't strictly necessary. I guess that feeling is still hanging on."

Maria didn't know what to say to that, but Clint didn't appear to be looking for any kind of response.

"It's going to pass," he said after a minute. "It's a stupid reaction and it's going to pass. Damn, psych is going to have a field day with me after this. If they even let me stay long enough to take their tests."

"No one is going to kick you out of SHIELD."

"I wouldn't blame them if they did."

"I would," she said firmly and he smiled at her again, this one a bit warmer than the last.

Clint reached out and took hold of her hand again, curling his fingers into hers as he got to his feet and gave Maria a gentle tug, urging her to follow. Without questioning where he was leading her to, she went with him out onto the balcony. From where they stood they could still hear everyone else inside, but were just out of sight. It was already dark outside and every working light in the city was blazing, blocking out the view of the stars overhead. He let go of her hand and turned his back to her, holding on to a bit of the glass railing that remained.

"Are you okay?" she asked, after watching him for a few minutes shift his eyes from the ground to the sky and back again.

"Yes. No. I don't know," he admitted slowly with a shrug. Turning to face her again, as he moved towards the wall, leaning back against it for better support, his eyes still occasionally darting to the sky. "It's not... I'll be fine. I will. And I didn't drag you out here to talk about me. I wanted to say thank you for... for just being here. I know Fury probably sent you and you're just doing your job but..."

"I thought we were going to stop thanking each other all the time for doing our jobs," she said, taking advantage of the pause in his words.

"That was before," he sighed heavily, turning his head back up to the sky as he continued to speak. All of his words sounded like sighs as if speaking had become a physical task and burden to him. "Before this mess. Before the last mess. God, my life has just been a series of fuck-ups saved by... by God knows what. Certainly not luck not... not for anything good."

"Clint..." she said quietly. "Don't do this. Don't... don't do this to yourself. Please." He tipped his head back towards hers and fixed his eyes on her own. "I'm not only here because Fury told me to be here," she said. "I'm not just doing my job. I want to be with you. I need... I need to know you're okay and that we're..."

Maria stopped herself, uncertain of what she wanted to say next. They weren't a priority, not now. She didn't know what they were, if they were still anything at all. And first she had to be certain that he was going to get through this. Clint was struggling, he was hurt and confused, and the last thing Maria wanted to do was add to that. She knew she needed to pull back and let him dictate what he needed for the time being, but Maria had never been good at that sort of thing.

For Clint she'd have to learn.

"What do you need me to do for you?" she asked.

"I don't need -"

"I'm serious," she said, interrupting his refusal.

Clint continued to hold her gaze before finally giving a small shrug with his shoulders and as he pushed himself up and away from the wall, he gestured her over and into his arms. Maria went very willingly, wrapping herself around him tightly; resting her cheek to his and feeling him sigh in relief against her ear. After a moment, Clint dropped his face into the crook of her neck so that she could feel his breath, warm and shaky, against her skin.

They stayed that way, locked in an embrace, for a very long time. To Maria it seemed as if the longer she held him, the more Clint needed to be held.

They both heard the door slide open, but neither of them bothered to move.

"Oops," Stark said, not really surprised at all to find them there. "So that's where you two got away to."

"What do you want, Tony?" Clint asked, not unkindly, lifting his head up just enough to ensure he'd be heard.

"I'm just... just checking," Stark answered and Maria heard real concern in his voice, something she didn't think the other man was capable of. "You know. Long day. I wanted to see how you faired, but Agent Hill apparently beat me to it."

"Did you need a hug, too?" Clint asked with half a laugh, as he moved in Maria's arms, his hands dropping to her waist.

"Maybe."

"Go away, Stark," Maria said, smiling as she dropped her head against Clint's shoulder.

"I will," he replied with a grin, because Maria was obviously less threatening than Romanoff had been, "but so that you know, our little shindig is winding down and I'd very much appreciate it if, you know, you got out. Of here, not the Tower. Stay at the Tower as long as you like but this is where Pepper and I live so... Out."

Maria reluctantly pulled herself out of Clint's arms and took him by the hand, moving past Stark without another word. On his way past, Clint tapped the other man on the shoulder good naturedly.

"She's a keeper, Barton," Stark called after him, and Maria shot a look at Clint when he laughed in response. "Quite the charming little princess."

They didn't stop to talk to anyone else, just silently made their way back to the room that Maria had found him in earlier in the evening. When they arrived, Romanoff's overnight bag was still missing and Hill's had appeared in its place. Maria took that to be a good thing; a sign that maybe she and Romanoff might actually be the friends Clint thought they could be one day. Or, in the very least, that Romanoff recognized the fact that Maria would do everything she possibly could to help Clint through this, same as she would in her place; maybe even more than she would in her place.

It wasn't as if Maria didn't still worry that she wasn't the stepping stone to something more between Clint and Romanoff. She still wasn't entirely convinced that one day that might be the case, their lives were too obviously intertwined. Maria decided that she couldn't worry about it. If she wanted this, if she wanted him, she would simply have to risk it. Maria had to do something she really hated doing; she had to let go. She had to trust him, to believe in him, and leave the rest to chance. Life was simply too short and too brutal to afford anything less.

Maria had made her peace with that possibility and was honestly okay with it.

"I've never been this tired before in my life," Clint admitted, as he stood looking helpless in the middle of the room.

Maria checked and double checked the lock on the door, knowing that ultimately it would be useless in keeping Stark out if he really wanted back in, but doing it out of habit just the same, before rejoining Clint.

"You need to sleep," she intoned, pulling him towards the bed and helping him off with his shirt in the process.

Clint sat down heavily on the bed and dropped his head back into his hands.

"I don't think I can. I can't stop... I can't shut it down. It's crazy. It is. But, it's like, whatever he did, whatever Loki did, all my own thoughts weren't stopped...he couldn't stop them, not really so it's like they were pushed aside, muted or... or recorded and now I'm back. Now that I'm here again, really here, I feel as if someone hit play and every thought I had, every single thing I wanted to say but couldn't... it all wants to come out. I just keep going over and over it inside my head and... I sound crazy, don't I?"

"You sound exhausted," as she moved to stand in front of him, dropping her hands to his shoulders and massaging the muscles there. Automatically his hands found their way back to her hips and tugged her close.

"I feel used up. Deflated. Done."

"If you're done, you're done," she said firmly, tilting his head up gently so that his eyes met hers. "That's your call. But don't let him make it for you."

Clint nodded and dropped his head down, placing his cheek to her stomach and pulling her closer still.

"You should get some sleep," she urged after several minutes of them, there, holding one another in their arms.

"You're right," he said moving back slowly and staring back up into her eyes. "But I really want to kiss you first."

"Barton -"

"No," he said firmly. "Don't do that. You called me Clint out there. Don't go back to Barton now."

"Okay, but I was only going to say that you don't have to ask to kiss me."

"I do," he insisted, and Maria's whole body tensed in anticipation, "because... I want you to understand that this isn't just some way for me to pass my time. It's never been that. Not for me. I don't want to fight about what happened before or what was said or what wasn't said. I'd like it if we could just start fresh, if that's what you want. I'd like to try again, only this time we'd both know what we were about. As much as I can know anything, that is... right now because... because..."

"Shut up, Clint," she said with a smile and a laugh on her lips as she leaned in and kissed

* * *

**Notes: **One more chapter to go...


	21. Chapter 21

_**xxi.**_

Maria had ended up dividing her time between the Helicarrier and Stark Tower. Her days were spent onboard, giving orders and making plans, same as it ever was. Her nights were spent among people she was gradually learning to think of as friends, and in Clint's arms, where it felt right and she felt needed. The carrier wasn't going anywhere for the time being, the repairs needed would not only be costly, but time consuming. The Tower was also a mess, but Stark already had big plans for all of them, whether they liked it or not. What also took time was the construction of the container-transport device for the Tesseract. The initial estimates had called for a few days tops, when reality dictated nearly a week.

She hated to say it, but Clint needed that time.

Each day he'd gotten a little better, a little more settled back into his own thoughts and patterns than he had been the day before. Maria couldn't be there as much as she'd wished she could, and had resigned herself to the fact that when she couldn't be at Clint's side, Romanoff would be.

It was an adjustment and took an awful lot of faith on Maria's part, but she didn't question it because it what he needed. Clint needed someone nearby to trust, at all times, and if he trusted Romanoff, she would too.

Maria was learning what faith and trust were all about between two people who were desperate to make it work; to have something more than themselves to believe in and that was a good thing. With every passing day it got just a little bit easier, a little less confusing and a whole lot more satisfying. She really couldn't figure out what had taken her so long. This was almost easy.

Almost.

The nightmares were the worst, and not just his. Clint had finally tallied up his totals and the news had nearly broken him all over again. He spent a large part of his nights thrashing about when he finally fell into a deep sleep, which wasn't nearly as easy to do after that first night. A few times he'd even become physically ill, but was slowly getting better. Maria still woke up in a cold sweat some nights, panicked over chasing cars down tunnels in her sleep. A few times he'd snapped in public at nothing in particular, too on edge to relax. A few times she'd jumped at trivial noises. They were both kind of a mess, a fact that only made them cling more to one another. It provided a weird kind of solace, even if it might be a bit unhealthy. Stark had suggested a vacation, a long one. He'd even gone so far as to offer to send them on one himself, down south to some island or another.

Something for another time perhaps.

Finally the day had come and Maria waited as patiently as she could onboard the ship. They were supposed to see Thor off and come straight back to officially report in. Director Fury had just gotten off the VTC with the World Security Council. Maria was trying to stay busy, but it was hard to do. Everything was done. There was nothing to do but wait.

A few hours after they'd received confirmation that Loki and the Tesseract were gone back to Asgard with Thor, Clint and Romanoff arrived back at the Helicarrier. Romanoff had already been cleared, almost immediately after the battle, but that wasn't the case with Clint. His first priority had to be medical which he'd been deftly avoiding at every turn. A unit had even showed up at the Tower, but Stark wouldn't let them in because they all knew Clint wasn't ready. He still wasn't ready in her opinion, but time had run out.

Maria didn't follow him, she knew she'd have to wait to see him, but she did track his progress from her workstation. As she'd expected, he sailed through the physical, it was the mental evaluation that held him up and he ended up stuck there until the end of the day. They had wanted to keep him overnight, which hadn't gone over well at all. Clint ended up raising such a ruckus that Director Fury had to go and personally sort it out. In the end they compromised; he was free to leave medical hold as long as he didn't leave the Helicarrier. More than before, Clint had begun to abhor the idea of being stuck in one place, but it was only temporary, so he reluctantly agreed.

As he said he would, Clint met her outside the cafeteria for dinner, but he looked uneasy. His eyes kept darting from person to person, and not helping the situation was the fact that more than a few people were openly staring back at him. And whispering. Maria knew he wasn't just being paranoid, people were talking.

"This was not a good idea," Clint said, leaning in close and managing to wipe the emotion from his face. "I shouldn't be here."

"I told you, they've all been briefed," Maria returned. "They all know what really happened."

"Sure, they've been told, but you can't make them believe it," Clint said, shaking his head. "I'm not going in. I'm..."

"Yes, you are," Romanoff answered, having snuck up on the two of them, thrusting a tray into his hands.

"What? You're going to make me," he fired back at her, his voice low but definitely threatening.

"If I have to," she answered, completely unfazed and so steady that Clint eventually shook his head and let out a small laugh.

"Okay, you probably could," he admitted, "but come on, Tasha. I don't need this. I can't..."

"You run now, you'll always run," she said, evidentially her last words, as Romanoff took her own tray and got into line.

Clint stood there for a moment and Maria stepped back and let him. She wouldn't force him, one way or another, even if she thought Romanoff was right.

Finally, with a deep breath, Clint shrugged and handed the tray he'd been holding off to Maria, before grabbing another for himself and getting into line. Once they had their meals and stepped out onto the cafeteria floor, Clint swore quietly and shook his head again, having spotted where Romanoff was sitting.

She'd picked the table in the dead center of the room.

"We don't have to sit there," Maria offered, but even she had to smile at sheer persistence of the other woman.

"If we don't, it'll be worse," Clint returned. "And not like... worse this way," he said, taking a quick look around the room; he was still drawing stares. "I mean worse like she'll start paging me over the PA and locking me out of my room. Screwing with my equipment. Whatever she can do to torment me, she will. For my own good, of course," he tacked on sarcastically. "I've done this dance before. It's easier to just go along."

Clint's idea of going along was decidedly different than Maria's. Clint sat down across from Romanoff and purposefully let his tray drop to the table the last few inches so that it made a nice, loud, bang, which actually elicited a smile in return. Maria sat down beside Clint and shook her head at the two of them. Sometimes they were kind of ridiculous together.

"Nice table," he said evenly, looking the other woman dead in the eyes. "What, you couldn't get a platform? No spotlight? I'm a bit disappointed. I'd have thought, if nothing else there'd be streamers and balloons. Maybe a clown."

"Clowns are for birthdays. But, tomorrow I'll set the two of you up a little sweetheart table," Romanoff said, wagging a finger across the table, "if you'd prefer."

"Please don't," Maria said, picking at her food with her fork.

"Are we talking the whole nine yards? Like, candlelight and china?"

"I think I can even arrange a violinist, if you're interested."

"No," Maria said, shaking her head firmly. She knew they were joking, but sometimes it was better to just say no on principle. Or on the off chance that they weren't joking.

"Sorry, Natasha," Clint said, shaking his head as well. "The boss says no."

"Does he call you that in bed?" Romanoff asked Maria, eyebrow raised and looking very much like she expected an answer.

Before Clint could object, thinking that maybe she'd crossed a line, Maria said completely straight-faced, "Well, I do out rank him."

Natasha nodded approvingly and Clint only shook his head and muttered, "I have made a horrible mistake," into his hands.

"Can I join you," Agent Sitwell said, briefly interrupting them as he stood beside the empty chair on Natasha's right. "Or is this a bad time?"

"No, it's fine," Maria said, surprising even herself by the laugh still in her voice. "Have a seat."

Before he did, Sitwell stopped and reached across the table to shake Clint's hand. "Good to have you back, Clint," he said.

"Thanks, Jasper."

After that the conversation became more general and the time passed rather pleasantly. They all knew Agent Jasper Sitwell, knew that he was a good man, and while there was no replacing Agent Coulson, he was the obvious choice. The best choice if one had to be made.

It was all going to be a major adjustment, but Maria was fairly confident they'd be okay.

Dinner done, Clint and Maria took a quick walk on the upper deck. He had confided in her, long ago, that tight spaces didn't always agree with him, but since the incident with Loki it had become more pronounced. Now it wasn't just small, crowded rooms or tight spaces he didn't like, it was all rooms, especially windowless ones that he couldn't stand. Elevators were completely out of the question. It all made his skin crawl. He needed a walk in the air before a night spent locked inside.

After their walk they ended up outside her door where Clint seemed hesitant to follow her inside.

"You don't have to stay," she said as she opened the door, "but I need to talk to you for a minute or two before you go. If you want to go."

"I don't, actually," he admitted as he entered the room and shut the door behind himself. "But I know I've been crowding your space. You don't have to ask me to stay over every night or even stay with me if you don't want to. You're busy. I get that."

"I'm not that busy and... I like having you around."

"But eventually... eventually I'm going to have to be alone again," Clint said. Maria didn't realize it, but she must have given him an odd look because he quickly added, "Not that I have plans to end this. That's not what I mean. I just... if I go out one assignment or on a mission. If they ever let me do that again... We're not always going to be at the same location so..."

"You think you should try a few nights alone," Maria finished for him, understanding why it was important, even if she didn't necessary like the idea much.

"I do."

"So," she said, dragging the word out. "Tonight?"

"No," he answered emphatically. "Tonight... tonight would not be good at all. Tonight," he repeated, stepping closer to her and wrapping his arms around her waist as he spoke, "I'd like to just crawl into bed beside you and listen as you read all the new policies that have no doubt popped up since I lost my mind and destroyed the place."

"Clint," she said warningly. He was toeing the line between self-mockery and self-hate. It was something Natasha had been very stern with him over, and Maria planned on doing the same.

"It was a joke."

"It was a bad one."

"I only know bad jokes."

"That one was better," she said with a faint laugh and he leaned in and kissed her, quick on the lips. And then again, lingering longer than the first time. But before he could move in for a third kiss, Maria stopped him. "We do need to talk," she said as she reluctantly extracted herself from his arms and crossed the room to the corner desk.

Clint stood there and watched as Maria pulled out a single sheet of paper from the drawer and waved him over.

"What's this?" he asked.

"It's an HR form," she answered, holding out a pen for him to take. "For us."

"Now you're joking," he laughed, but she just shook her head slowly. "You're not joking? Wow, they really do have one of these for every situation, don't they?"

"They are thorough," she admitted.

"So... what is this exactly," he said, picking it up and looking it over. "Some kind of contract? An agreement? I mean..."

"It's not anything like that. It just basically says we're... that we're... you know... involved in a..."

"Relationship?" he provided for her, smiling a little bit too smugly for Maria's tastes.

"Yes," she said. "A relationship. This way it's on file. It's known. We'll probably work with each other less directly as a result but... but this is the right way to go about it."

Clint nodded along with her words as he scanned over the form, but there was a frown on his face.

"What happens if..." he started to ask but had to stop and clear his throat, the words having gotten stuck along the way. "If I do something... If something happens again and I lose control or... What happens to you? What does this do to you?"

"Nothing."

"You can't know that."

"I do know that," Maria answered, "because... nothing happened to me this last time."

"We weren't -"

"We weren't really," she agreed, "but we were. And they already knew. Everyone already knows. The council did... they did question me but nothing more. I wasn't reprimanded or censored or anything else. Really."

Clint nodded again but she could tell he wasn't sold.

"And..." she said, shutting her eyes and knowing she had to just get it out there. Maria had wanted to wait for the right time to bring it up, but that right time was never coming. Now was the only time. "...about that. Right after Loki took over, right after you..."

"Yeah?" he said, indicating she didn't have to spell it out.

"Like I said, they questioned me and... and I was the one that told them about you being with him. I didn't... I wasn't looking to get back at you. I swear it. I didn't know everything that had happened just that... just that you'd left the lab and... They asked me and I told them what happened, exactly as it had happened."

Clint stood there and stared at her for a minute, waiting for more information.

"Clint?"

"Okay."

"Okay?"

"Yeah," he said simply.

"And you're not mad?" she asked, confused.

"You told them the truth. Am I supposed to be mad?"

"I don't know. I thought you might be. Everyone else..."

"Who?" he asked, his eyes narrowing.

"It doesn't matter now," Maria answered.

Clint nodded and let it go, but Maria had a feeling it was just a temporary reprieve. He was going to find out who on his own. He'd have to, because Maria wasn't going to say.

"None of that makes me feel any better about signing this," he said. "But... if you think it's important," he finished, leaning over and adding his signature to the bottom. "There. All official. Happy?"

"I don't need the form."

"Good, because neither do I. But it does make you happy, a little bit, right? Admit it. I know how you like to follow protocol."

"I really do," she said with a smile, wrapping her arms around his neck.

"It's a kind of disease," he replied. "You may want to get that looked into."

"Is it that hard for you to follow directions?"

"Yes," he laughed, pulling her closer and leaning in for a quick kiss. "I like to do things the way I like to do them."

"And I like to do things the way they're supposed to be done."

"Are you already trying to break up with me or something?" he asked jokingly. "Because we just signed the form."

"No," she answered, and she really meant it. "No... but..."

Maria couldn't help it. Doubt was practically her middle name. She wanted this, she wanted to be with Clint, and she wanted everyone to know it, but it was still scary. They were different people and nothing was guaranteed, especially with the lives they both lived. It was a risk, and Maria wasn't normally a risk taker. But she wanted this. Ultimately, that mattered most. She wanted this, and when she wanted something, Maria made it happen no matter what, and she knew Clint was the same.

That didn't mean it wasn't going to be a difficult transition for them both.

"Listen," Clint said, sensing some of her internal struggle, "I'm pretty sure I'm looking at a month solid of sitting on the sidelines after the docs are all done peeking into my head and making sure they got all the Loki out. Now, and this is just a guess, but you've probably got some vacation time coming. So do I. Why don't we take Tony up on that offer? Take a week or two off and just sit on a beach somewhere sunny and warm. No work. No alien attacks. No anything just... just relaxing by the water with some of those pink drinks that come with tiny umbrellas in them."

"I'd have to buy a bathing suit."

"You'd have to buy a bikini," he corrected with a wicked smile.

"We'd need to get this approved first."

"Of course," he agreed.

"It... it sounds like fun," she finally admitted.

"Good," he said, kissing her again, this one lasting a little longer than the last. "And, you know, until then... let's ease back into this. There's no hurry to make us any more than we are. I know things have been a bit... I know I've probably... Damn it, I'm just saying I don't want you to feel obligated to be with me because it kind of seems like you do."

"That's not why I'm here," Maria said sincerely. "I've never been very good at expressing myself and I know I come off like I don't... care for you, but that isn't true. I do. I really do."

"I'm not very good at that myself," Clint admitted, smiling easier than before. "I've always been more comfortable showing instead of telling."

Maria looked at him and it suddenly struck her how true his words were.

She dropped her head against his chest and pulled him to her and thought about what a fool she'd been, as what he said washed over her and truly sunk in.

For all her tightly held beliefs about needing proof and evidence before she could trust, she'd been ignoring all of what Clint had been providing. She'd spent years guarding herself against people who spoke lovingly and acted cruel; expecting that behavior from everyone no matter the case, because of the past and because it was what she was conditioned to expect. But here he was. Here was the exact opposite. Clint's words had never been cruel or even very mean, often only as direct as her own words could be and had been to him, but Clint's actions had always been kind. He'd always been nothing short of loving in the way he touched her, held her, and ultimately treated her.

Maria thought of herself not just as a fool, but as a blind one as well.

How had she missed it for so long?

"What's wrong?" Clint asked, whispering softly in her ear as she continued to cling to him, desperate not to cry.

"Nothing," Maria answered, shaking her head and finally able to meet his eyes again. "I just... I understand you. What you mean. I understand."

"Good," he sighed, looking relieved before he continued on, his tone lighter, "Because I'm never going to be that guy who is writing you love poems or singing you songs. Maybe I can get you flowers. I don't know. Do you even like flowers?"

"I have allergies."

"Well then, no flowers for you."

"I don't need those things," she said with a shake of her head. "Just you."

"I am up for that challenge," he replied, half serious again and looking at her like no one had ever looked at her before. It made her whole body feel lighter somehow. The very next thing he did was tilt his head towards hers and press his lips slowly against her own.

"Hmm," she said, breaking away after a moment or two lost in thought, "but I will need that trip to the beach."

"Oh, that's happening," he said with a sly grin, kissing her quickly again. "That is a very good idea. One of my better ones."

"Wasn't that Stark's idea?" she shot back at him playfully, sneaking in another kiss.

"I'm going to pretend it wasn't. Unless you want him to come along?"

"No. Just you."

"Are you sure?" he asked before Clint leaned in and kissed her again, harder this time. With more intensity and need. Moving her back towards the bed. His hands slid into her hair, gently pulling it free and loose.

"I think you just like hearing me say that," she said as she sat down on the edge of the bed, a smile on her lips.

"I do," he said, in between kisses, each more urgent than the last. "I really do," he finished, kneeling down in front of her, his arms wrapped tightly around her waist.

"Is that what you want?" she asked as he continued to nuzzle her neck. "To hear me say that I want you?"

"Yes," he said, meeting her eyes and kissing her, gently pushing her backwards as she drug her hands over his shoulders.

"That I need you?" she continued, smiling at his reaction. At his smile, as he leaned over her and their lips met again with a desire of their own.

"Oh, hell yes," he laughed as they broke apart again, content to take this slow. To make this moment last as long as it could.

"That I..." she started and then abruptly stopped herself.

She couldn't finish. Not because she didn't mean it and not because she didn't want to. Maria hesitated because, even if it was true, it was still frightening. She trusted him, she wanted this and she believed in him, completely.

Still...

Clint didn't flinch or hesitate or show any reaction, any indication that she'd said, or not said, something wrong. He continued to look at her, to keep looking at her, exactly the same way he had been before. He kissed her forehead. He kissed her lips. He kept his eyes on hers until she felt like it was okay.

She didn't have to say it because he knew.

"You," she said softly. "There is just you."

"No," he said, his voice barely a whisper against her lips. "There's us."

**The End.**

* * *

**Notes: **It's done! I never, ever, ever thought I'd be writing fic for this ship, but once I started I couldn't stop. I'm currently working on the next story in my Recruitment series, so I don't have anything immediately planned to follow this one up, but I wouldn't rule it out! Thanks for reading - I hope you liked it! Thanks again!


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